WhoDeyRevolution

Leading Question: "Did shirt get Bengals fan in trouble?"

Doc writes today about WDR Hero "Chris" who has worn his "FIRE BRATKOWSKI" to PBS for three years.  While the details are vague, Chris was asked the leave the Bills game for allegedly "waving [the shirt] in people's faces," an herculean feat conisdering he was wearing it at the time.  And the guy who threw out Chris for his clearly BLACK shirt?  None other than suspiciously named Nick WHITECOTTON. 

I'll let Doc take it from here:

Here’s why it matters. Here’s a lesson the club has fumbled on numerous occasions over years of mostly losing:

Fans count.

Their collective voice matters beyond the ballot box, where they spoke loudly to pay for your stadium. Their voice is relevant beyond the turnstiles, where they’ve chirped incessantly in your favor, to the tune of 57 consecutive sellouts, a streak broken just two weeks ago.

It isn’t that a guy says he was asked to leave PBS because he was displaying improperly a T-shirt. It’s that the issue ever came up.

“What did I do wrong?:” Chris asked, not unreasonably.

In this corner, we have Chris, whose family has had Bengals season tickets since there was a season. All the way back to ’68. Chris, who went to the Freezer Bowl at age 7, with his uncle. Who has had season tickets of his own since 1999.

In that corner, we have the Bengals and their hired security outfit, who judged Chris to be unruly and a disturber of the fan-friendly peace.

Here: Chris, who says he and his father “bonded’’ at Bengals games when Chris was a child; Chris, who says “to not renew (tickets) would be very painful.”
There: The Bengals, whose security arm shows Chris the gate.

Does a 2-9 team with a reputation for fan-unfriendliness need to be perceived as stifling the free speech of a long-time customer?

If a guy wants to display a FIRE BOB BRATKOWSKI shirt, by wearing it or waving it or running up his personal flag pole, he should be permitted that bit of civil disobedience. We’d give the Bengals the benefit of the doubt here, only they haven’t earned it. They’re not strangers to quashing dissent. Banners judged to be “negative’’ frequently are torn down at Paul Brown Stadium.

The team too often acts in a manner consistent with its entitlements. It leads with its head, not with its heart. If its fans believe ownership to be unresponsive to their wishes, it’s only because ownership gives them good reason.

Bengals Prospects for the Future: Look Out Below...

Since my boss expects me to actually do my job I have been unavoidably detained from writing recently about the Bengals season.  The quick summary?  The bottom fell out and how exactly the team turns this around is unclear.  And I'm not talking about this season or next.  I'm kinda talking about permanently.

Go to Joe Reedy for the scary details.

The Bengals potentially need:  a QB, most of an offensive line, a defensive line, a linebacking corp, wide receivers and a running back, an offensive coordinator, and a head coach.

Not to mention a front office, of course.

Who Dey!  Right?  Right???

Happy Thanksgiving from WDR

To our loyals readers, Happy Thanksgiving from all of us here at Who Dey Revolution.  We started this site in April 2008, but you are the reason we are still here.  And you can rest assured, we will remain here until there is real change inside the Bengals organization.

So, today we stop to say thanks for a fantastic two and a half years.  Thanks for reading, thanks for commenting, and thanks for joining us on this seemingly endless battle.

Finally, Happy Turkey Day to Mike Brown.  I'm sure he's talked Golden Corrall into one hell of a family discount.

Brat Wired For Sound

Per Baghdad Hob at Bengals.com, Bob Bratkowski will be wired for sound during tonight's Bengals-Jets game. 

Can't wait to hear the genius at work.

DDN: "Bengals fans need to let their feelings be known"

From Tuesday's Dayton Daily News comes a plea for Bengals fans to "let their feelings known." WDR agrees with the main crux of this article, but we would NEVER accept anyone becoming a Browns or Steelers fan.

Article in full after the jump:

The Five Biggest Reasons Fans Let Mike Brown Lose 200 Games Faster Than You

Last Tuesday WDR Comrade BMN chimed in with an exhaustive guest post about how Mikey's record setting 200th loss as owner/GM stacked up againt other NFL owners.  Now he is back with a post on his take on why Bengals fans have put up with the losing for so long.  Enjoy.

Call this a frustrating psychological examination.  Frustrating because it sounds like I’m about to go on a wild victim-blaming rant.  Frustrating because it sounds a lot like the abused spouse going into a long-winded rant about all the things they have done to let the abuse continue instead of focusing on the douchebaggery that is the abuser.  A condemnation of the “sheople” as many of my fellow MBSers like to say.  I hope you believe me when I tell you it’s nothing of the sort.

Instead, I prefer to think of this article as a condemnation of Mike Brown’s diabolical (from a football standpoint, anyway) abilities to keep the city of Cincinnati in a stranglehold.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s clearly obvious that Mike Brown isn’t exactly going to be elected mayor of the Queen City anytime soon.  No one is suggesting for a moment that he’s the darling of the town. 

Yet the anger towards him has ebbed and flowed and now it has dissipated to a certain degree.  Fans have resigned themselves to helplessness.  The recent news that the Bengals’ sellout streak will finally come to merciful end begs the question:  how can a team that was en route to helping Mike set such a record of futility get such loyal support?  Why weren’t fans boycotting in droves? 

There are multiple reasons and if you comb the WDR archives, there’s wisdom to be gleaned from both the articles and the comments.  So what you read below is really nothing new:  it’s merely a condensation, an articulation, a grab-bag of ideas.  If you could boil the motivations of the average “sheople” (ooopps..sorry, said I wouldn’t do that), you’d find five different psychological pieces of trickery courtesy of one Michael Brown.

1) IF I LEAVE YOU NOW (I TAKE AWAY THE BIGGEST PART OF YOU)

If there’s one sports meme I’d like to transform into a human being just so that I could flog it unmercifully to hear it scream, it’d be that of the “NFL Experience.”  This ridiculous, trite marketing tool has left slobbering fools out of a pack of people that ought to know better.  The meme thrives largely because people love to go to NFL games but usually the choice is very limited.  This is where New York/New Jersey sports fans have an advantage:  like choosing between two McDonald’s, they have two organizations they can choose to purchase football from. 

Mike Brown very effectively waved this meme over everyone’s heads in the mid-1990s:   “you can have one NFL team or you can have none.  If I leave, you will have none.”  There’s really no way to prove this but wow, a lot of people believe it.  It scares them to death.  Because of it, they complain endlessly about the team but remain convinced their lives would be 200% more miserable if they had no team.  Mike used that fear to fleece the taxpayers into the current stadium that houses his definition of “competitive football,” which I’m relatively confident differs from most of the people that voted for the tax.

I’m a consumer and I freely admit that I consume a lot of the NFL.  I sometimes hit up sports bars to catch multiple games at once.   But if I lived in a one-horse town with only one sports bar in town and they spit in my nachos every week, I wouldn’t go back.  I am not addicted enough to the NFL to tolerate something that negative, much less Mike Brown willfully changing nothing about the home organization while it irritates me. 

Which leads to…

2) CALL ME ANYTHING, BUT DON’T CALL ME FAIRWEATHER!

Marvin Lewis: Bengal-ized

Marvin Lewis in January 2003

Marvin Lewis in October 2010

Bengals Collapse: What It Means

The Bengals don't just hilariously misspell their own player's names, they also fail in even more spectacular ways!  Let's take a walk through the discarded remains of the 2010 Cincinnati Bengals after their historic collapse!

• Guaranteed 18th non-winning season in last 20 years.
• Lost 12 of last 15 games.
• From Reedy: This is the 11th losing streak in team history of seven straight or more and the ninth since 1991.
• "If the season ended today, the Bengals would have the third pick in the draft. Last year at this time they were the third seed in the AFC. Now, they have the worst record in the conference...."
• Bengals will likely be underdogs in their remaining 6 games  As Reedy wrote: "The Bengals have never gone winless in October AND November in the same season. Guess what? It looks like it has a very good chance of happening."
• Marvin is officially dead man walking. 
• TO: Welcome to Bengals Nation! After the game, TO said what we all know.  No more "we need to play all 4 quarters" or "A few big plays here or there and we would be right back in it.  Nope, he said ""Let me look you in the eyes and emphasize - we are terrible.  Let me emphasize terrible. We find ways to lose. We may go two and whatever. Fourteen."
• Bengals are guaranteed to start next season, their 12th in PBS, without a playoff win.  How do you calculate that Return on Investment on a $600M stadium?

So the question, like most years, is where do we go from here?  As fans, have you finally had enough?  Do you finally see that in a league with the parity of the NFL, you are going to have flash in the pan seasons like 2005 and 2009, but without the foundation of a strong front office, coaching, training, scouts, etc, you will ALWAYS regress to the bottom?  To paraphrase Doc, does Mike Brown want to win?  Yes, much like I want to win the lottery or get cozy with a Victoria's Secret.  It might happen, but its all luck. 

If you want to see the Bengals win football games, it is time for fans to stop complaining and hoping, and to stop supporting this team financially.  Until then, the Browns have no incentive to change.

Luxury Suite Update

From Doc's recap article:

A binocular-aided perusal of the East luxury boxes revealed 14 that were entirely empty. Whether those boxes are leased and were unused, or simply vacant, only the Bengals bookkeepers know for sure.

How about we try to make sure the Bengals aren't the only ones who know this info?

WDR is officially soliciting information on luxury suites.  Do you know a firm that owns one (and can verify this)?  Does the firm you work for own one?  Do you own one (and can I punch you)?  Can you put us in touch with someone who might have good knowledge on who owns luxury suites (I've heard law firms may own a good chunk, how appropriate)?  Did you happen to peruse the West luxury suites with your binoculars and can you let us know how many of those were empty?

Send any GOOD information (i.e., not just speculation) to whodeyrevolution-at-gmail.

The Bengals 2010 Season. The Bengals Under Mike Brown. Behold.

 
Chris Crocker, a player who resisted bungalization if there ever was one, lies injured with his name spelled conspicuously and inappropriately wrong on the jumbotron.  Chris was a stubborn student.  But his re-education is now complete.  Welcome to Bengaldom, Chris.

You can try to fight Mike Brown.  But you will fail.