WhoDeyRevolution

Some quick thoughts..

A few odds and ends before tomorrow’s game…

• Hobspin has a great new article up on the buzz around a special team’s unit that currently ranks 15^th in DVOA. Granted, Mike Nugent has nailed all ten of his field goal attempts all season, and after the joys last year of watching a guy named Clint Stitser spasm his way to two missed PAT’s and the whole unit work its way to the 28^th rank in DVOA, this season appears a revelation. However, there are two problems with Hobspin’s point. One, as I’ll continue to proclaim to the day I die of multiple cleat-wounds to the chest, kicking accuracy is not consistent year-to-year and thus not an actual skill. Nugent, like all kickers with high field-goal percentages, will regress sooner than later. Second, Brandon Tate, he of the average kickoff and punt return numbers, really doesn’t seem like that explosive a returner. All he does on punt returns is make a bunch of fancy moves that make Bengals fans gasp with anticipation before realizing that he’s been taken down for a single-digit gain, and also that they’re still wasting their time watching Mikey Boy’s footballers. Hobspin’s implication that Tate will soon become a great returner because he’s an explosive player (which somehow hasn’t led to any results in 2+ NFL seasons) and is being coached by the immortal Darrin Simmons (whose credentials are lazily awed at by Hobspin because of the Bengals ’05 and ’09 playoff berths, during which his unit ranked 14^th and 21^st, respectively) really doesn’t make any sense. Special teams won’t be a struggle this season like last year—it just won’t be especially strong.
• Football Outsiders has some interesting data in a recent column, distinguishing early-season offensive sack numbers by whether they were given up long after the snap (3 seconds or more) or shortly after (2.5 seconds or less). So far, the Bengals have conceded the sixth-most “long snaps”. The Bengals' just below-average adjusted sack rate for this season, based on this, is a testament to the offensive line (mostly Andrew Whitworth’s elite play and the others’ non-Levi Jones-ness) and also the skill players like Jermaine Gresham and the backs who have stayed in to pass block. Many sacks have been due to Andy Dalton holding on to the ball and not porous blocking, showing that Dalton still has much developing to do (shocking) and that the Bengals offense might benefit from opening things up a bit. Right now, the Bengals receivers are having trouble getting open quickly, facing double-teams (especially AJ Green) without tight ends and backs to consistently take the attention away from them; this problem can be reduced by leaving less men in to block, which the o-line, especially with the return of Bobbie Williams, might be able to handle.
• The game against the Jaguars, like most of them at this point, serves as a barometer for where the Bengals are. Jacksonville has played like one of the worst teams in the league, with a decent defense but perhaps the worst offense in the NFL. For the Bengals to prove that they’ve made progress, that they actually aren’t a bottom-dwelling team, they need to not just win the game, but do so in a more convincing fashion than against Cleveland or Buffalo. As long as the Bengals can stop Maurice Jones-Drew and Dalton limits his mistakes, they should be fine; if the defense can’t stop the run even when facing a rookie quarterback and Dalton can’t avoid stupid plays even when the opposing offense can’t do anything, then it’ll be yet another close game. And yes, I do realize that the Jaguars are actually favored tomorrow, but I'm not sure how many people in Las Vegas watched Blaine Gabbert last week.
• Just a quick reminder, even though most people probably don’t need it: if the Bengals win tomorrow, getting above .500 and within half-a-game of first (because yeah, that’s a possibility), don’t go to any games this season. You want to watch Andy Dalton and AJ Green and Jermaine Gresham on good teams, playing in important and well-publicized games? Force change; force good ‘ole Mikey Boy to care about limiting our dissatisfaction with his mom-and-pop organization. This is the only way we can one day reveal we’re Bengals fans without making a self-deprecating joke!

Mike Brown vs. Art Rooney

Forgive us if you have already seen these, but some hero has put together 2 Xtranormal videos of Mike Brown talking to Art Rooney.

To give you some perspective, the Steelers had only had 7 losing seasons since 1972, and since 2005 are 72-35 with 2 Super Bowl wins and potentially a third this year.

The Bengals had had 2 winning seasons in the last 20 and haven't won a playoff game since 1991.

Food for Thought - Mike Brown & the Estate Tax

(warning, this post is hugely speculative and its conclusions are certainly wrong in a material way - now keep reading please!)

People call Mike Brown a good businessman from time to time.  Given how rich he has made himself off of the Bengals, it is hard to argue.  But nevertheless, I have. 

Basically I think a) he does not deserve credit for stumbling into a hugely popular monopoly and b) he leaves large amounts of money on the table by not bringing the franchise into the modern era with a front office and better facilities (a rather minor investment, quite frankly).

I think a lot about why the Bengals pursue this strategy of profitability - playing it safe with a bare-bones operation, knowing the fans will take the shit they give them, instead of building out a winning and potentially more lucrative organization.

Okay, so Mike fancies himself a football man, and the Brown's a football family, and this is how they have always done it so dammit that's the way they will continue to do it.  Surely that is part of it.

But I think more and more the estate tax might have quite a bit to do with it.  Clearly, family trumps everything in the Brown world.  They want the team to remain in the family.  It is just assumed that Mike can pass along the team to Katie but things changed post stadium deal.  The Bengals, before just nicely profitable, became hugely valuable, worth between $500 million and a $1 billion.  With an estate tax rate of about 50%, and assuming Mike Brown owns at least 51% of the team, that is at least a $125+ million liability the IRS will ask for upon Mike's death (Nancy's if she outlives him I suppose). 

They cannot meet that kind of cash liability without selling the team.

Now, the whole family is lawyers.  Likely well versed in the laws pertaining to closely-held companies and taxes.  So they have a plan.  My former boss used to be an estate tax lawyer.  He, and another small business owner I spoke to, both seemed to think they likely have set up already or will set something up where Mike sells the team to Katie while he is still alive to avoid the estate tax.

How they do this is the question.  Both seemed to think it would like something like this:  Mike sells the Bengals (at a family discount, of course) to Katie and simultaneously loans her the money (at very favorable rates of 0% - borrowing against the value of the franchise) to make the purchase.  Katie would then use the profits from the Bengals to slowly pay down the loan Mike gave her to buy the team.

Voila, estate taxes avoided.

(The devil is in the details of course, and I don't know those.  Also, I don't know how this avoids capital gains taxes, which should be large.  However, they are currently only 15% as opposed to 50% - so maybe 15% of whatever gains there are is small enough for the Brown family to be able to pay without having to sell the team)

Anyway, the point is the Bengals make nice coin right now, probably enough to make a scheme like this possible.  But if indeed they are doing something like this, they have a huge incentive not to risk their profitability, even if the Bengals aren't as profitable as they probably could be with some changes.

My take:  I suspect much of the reason why no practice facility will get built on the Brown's dime, why we probably won't keep all our young talent (JJ & Leon) when they become free agents even though we can afford it, and why no serious effort is made to hire more people in the front office is that the Brown's need to be as safely profitable as possible, so their precious team can stay in the family.  Not just because they're tightwads.

After the fold, I'll post some of the Q&A and I had over email about the these issues with a small business owner.

MikeyBoyZilla

Badass artwork courtesy of Rachel. 

Reporter: Hello, I am reporting live from right outside Cincinnati and if you are just tuning in you are NOT HALLUCINATING! That is a three thousand foot tall MikeyBoyZilla using the P&G towers like two oven mitts about to pick up a burning hot plate of meatloaf. 

The first sightings of MikeyBoyZilla were reported in Mason this morning, where the behemoth crushed an indoor soccer facility that the Cincinnati Bengals recently used to practice in. Bystanders that witnessed the destruction say that the monster mumbled something about, "Jacked up rental pricing." 

MikeyBoyZilla then spent the next hour uprooting and swallowing unfortunate Denny's franchises. Once his hunger for delicious Grand Slamwiches was sated he made his way downtown where, as you can see, he is currently wreaking havoc.  

Once again, if you are just tuning in, this isn't a bad dream. It's more like a metaphor for what Mike Brown has done to the city over the last 20 years coming to real life. 

Bengals Raise Ticket Prices; Fund 377,770 More Denny's Grand Slams for Mikey Boy

Mikey Boy Brown is so excited about last season that the Bengals just announced they will be raising ticket prices for the 2010 season!  Single-game tickets will be raised $3 per game for seats in the field level and convertible club and $1 per game for the canopy level and second-level end zone. The average ticket price for 2010 will be $73.34, compared to $71.04 last season.

That doesn't sound like much, but if you do some basic back of the napkin calculations you see that this adds up to approximately 377,770 more Denny's Grand Slams for Mikey Boy, per year.

Here is how we came to that calculation:

Average ticket price increase of $2.30. 

Capacity in Paul Brown Stadium of 65,535

10 home games (2 pre-season and 8 home games).

Grand Slam Cost: $3.99

$2.30 x 65,535 x 10 = $1,507,305/$3.99 = 377,770.7 more grand slams per year for Mikey!

Aqua Bengal Has Better Hands Than Coats Without Opposable Thumbs.

Hob, TE's, FJM-style.

The Bengals want more consistency from their tight ends,

I don't think consistency is the word you're looking for there. The ability to not suck? That works better.

but they aren’t ready to exile Dan Coats or J.P Foschi or activate third-rounder Chase Coffman even though he’s been good enough in practice that head coach Marvin Lewis is calling him all-Hamilton County.

I think Marvin's making fun of our fair county, because if Coffman can't get time with these two buffoons ahead of him, then all-Hamilton County must not mean much. Or it means Coffman could absolutely walk on at Elder and start right away.

The Option of Collins

Hey, did you know that Andre Smith remains a hold-out? (Alvin Keels wants to use this silly new-age thing called the "slotting system." What?)

Last week I made an argument that the offense's success in '09 depends primarily on the line's progression, and Bob Bratkowski's ability to adjust to it. One would assume the presence of Smith would be vital going by this logic; some, however, don't. The reason? Anthony Collins.

God, Please Put Mike Brown On Waivers. It's An Ability Thing.

I only caught the last 10 minutes or so of Hard Knocks last night. And I wish I hadn't seen it. Watching Mike Brown sit at the front of a Georgetown classroom and act a fool confirmed all of our worst theories about how the Bengals actually are behind closed doors. I've been trying to wrap my mind around the scenario, and what I keep coming up with is that Mike Brown lives in a world of delusion. No one tells him that most of the players and ideas he brings to the team are spectactularly awful. And since no one calls him on his disabilities he just keeps on playing make believe like he did when his dad was around. Paul Brown may have done the same sort of tinkering with his team but he had decades of teaching and coaching and evaluating talent to rely on. All Mike did before he took the reins was exist as a big round flesh toned bowling ball. 

This situation is so sad. Marvin had his shot at being a head coach neutered by Mikey. The first half of Carson's career is going to pass by with him only playing in one playoff game. Mike Zimmer's head is going to explode after his linebacking corp is decimated by injuries and Mike Brown tells him Brad St. Louis has good lateral quickness and a linebackin' body. And all the while two generations of football fans in Cincy are never going to know what it feels like to have confidence while rooting for their team.

@OGOchoCinco Thinks @MikeyBoyBrown is "Funny Ass Hell"

Chad Johnson is using Twitter at the same rate I used my Game Boy when I was 8 - the guy just will not put it down.  He has compared Michael Jackson's death to 9/11, challenged Mike Golic to a fight, and punked the world with this fake facial tattoos.

He has also had a few conversations with WDR's own fake, satirical account @MikeyBoyBrown.

Last night Johnson made a joke about going on ESPN to host his own show.   So @MikeyBoyBrown replied to Chad thusly:

@OGOchoCinco I am forbidding you from hosting a show at ESPN. I don't want you to know what a successful, well run organization looks like.

Here was Chad's response:

@MikeyBoyBrown, every time you write something its funny ass hell, but stop talking about my owner. i am going to host and take over!!!!

Chad - if you want to run the MikeBoyBrown Twitter account, the invitation is in the mail.

MikeyBoyBrown and Chad Johnson Chat on Twitter

MikeyBoyBrown is WDR's 100% fake, fabricated, satirical (did that satisfy the lawyers?) Twitter profile on Bengals Owner/GM/curmudgeon Mike Brown.  Usually MikeyBoyBrown discusses his latest devious plans to buy day old bread for half off and other similar penny-pinching shenanigans.  But last night he was up WAY past his bedtime (likely after getting all those newfangled channels after the analog/digital switch) and got into a discussion on Twitter with Chad Johnson - the real one. 

Chad was a great sport, enjoying the conversation but also defending his boss.  Comrade Showtime was behind this ingenious dialogue for WDR. 

Below is the chronological transcript of the conversation, which is public for anyone to view if you are following @OGOchoCinco or @MikeyBoyBrown.  Enjoy.

MikeyBoyBrown@OGOchoCinco Chad - you're going to live with Carson? I'm sub-leasing my guest bedroom for $475/mo. Need that cash! Utilities not included.

OGOchoCinco@MikeyBoyBrown wow, who did this account with the boss mans picture on it, yall are silly

MikeyBoyBrown@OGOchoCinco It's me Chad. By the way, don't forget to give me some stamps so I can mail your paychecks to you in '09. I ain't buying those.

MikeyBoyBrown@OGOchoCinco Confession - I would have tried to trade you last year but I only get free long distance to 2 other teams.

OGOchoCinco@MikeyBoyBrown Very funny, you want to start cracking jokes, i got more jokes than north korea got nuclear war heads