Bengals Booth Podcast: Serenity Now

least a few of you. There was a character on Seinfeld named Frank Costanza, played by the hilarious Jerry Stiller, who was advised by his doctor to say serenity now every time he got angry in order to keep his blood pressure down. Other characters on the show tried to use the same expression and it didn't work out so well. If you haven't seen the episode, you can see a

bunch of Serenity Now clips on YouTube. Coming up on the podcast, you'll hear radio replays from the game, locker room interviews with several players, and Dave Lapham will join me for postgame analysis. Plus in this week's Fun Facts Interview, I'll talk to Bengals tight end Matt Lengel, who is part of an amazing list. Tom Brady has thrown touchdown passes to seventy one different receivers. That's an NFL record, and yes, one of them is Matt Lengel. I'll talk

to him about that and much more. All of that is straight ahead, but first, here's a quick reminder that you can have the latest edition of this podcast delivered right to your phone, tablet, or computer by subscribing on iTunes, Stitcher, or pod Bean. It's the greatest invention since smart wool socks. No matter how cold it gets, the window in the broadcast booth must be open during the game. I think it's important as an announcer to hear the crowd and

have a true sense of the weather conditions. And the cold generally doesn't bother me that much as long as my feet aren't frozen, and they never are as long as I remember my smart wool hiking socks. Enough about my feet, let's get to the game. The first quarter was actually entertaining. The Bengals entered the game last in the league in yards aloud and thirty if in points aloud.

Facing Drew Brees and the Saints. A rough day was a distinct possibility, and New Orleans began the game with a fifteen play, seventy five yard touchdown drive that took eight and a half minutes off the clock. From the seven yard line. Second down in goal for the Saints, Breeze fakes a handoff looking left, throws toward the left side of the end zone, diving attempt for the catch. It is a touchdown for New Orleans. Wow Michael Thomas

with the catch. An amazing throw from Drew Brees. Unbelievable throw. I mean that coverage is excellent. I mean Will Jackson can't do much better than that. Rnity, Now here's Jackson on Drew Brees and the Saints offense. They got a lot of whippers. I mean they got a great scheme. They have great route cumbinations. Isn't not then in the quarterback obviously he's he's one of the kind. He thought the ball where the defender can't get it. I mean,

hit the one pig this year. So it's just a great quarterback and he put it in the right spots. Let's face it. For the Bengals to have a chance to pull off the upset, they were going to have to score a bunch of points, and Cincinnati's opening drive was a thing of beauty. Eight plays seventy five yards to tie the game with two minutes left in the first quarter. First in goal from the three yard line for Cincinnati, Dalton under center fakes a handoff he wants

to throw. He passes for Ross touchdown. Bengals a crossing route on the back line of the end zone, and John Ross hauls in his third touchdown catch of the season. So at that point, Bengals fans were thinking maybe, just maybe the team could overcome at struggling defense and win a shootout. Here's Tyler Boyd. We gotta score regardless. This is a hard league. You know. Everybody puts up thirty points a game. So if you don't score a points, I mean, it's hard to win. So I'm more, you know,

frustrated on offense in anything, especially after the way it started. Definitely, Man, just just seeing that drive. You know, we controlled the ball. We didn't get in any situations where we got hesitate or we felt we have any pressure. You know, we just everything was clicking. You know, once everything stays that weight and skies and limit. Man, I say that every week, we just gotta stay consistent. For a lesson in consistency, I present the New Orleans Saints. On their second drive,

they went seventy five yards on six plays. Now Kamara sprinting to the right, Drew brees back to throw screens it back to the left, Ingram running down the sideline to the fifteen. The ten spin moved there, gets away from Sean Williams and runs into the end zone for a New Orleans touchdown. The Saints third drive was ninety yards in nine plays. Breeze hands it off to Kimara and he runs into the end zone for New Orleans touchdown. Following the left side of the offensive line. Three possessions,

three tds for the Saints. Drive number four was sixty yards. It's a pitch to the left, Kimara being chased by Hubbard, Sam can't catch him, touchdown, New Orleans. It was twenty eight seven with one twenty two left in the half. After hunting on two straight possessions, the Bengals desperately needed to get some points before the half. Instead, Serenity now Dalton catches the shotgun snap He's gonna fire for John Ross Now intercepted at the five yard line. The Saints

have the football to the thirty. The thirty five Pas Williams to the fifty. Andy Dalton trying to get him on a bounds he can't. Alex Erickson hustles and tackles Williams with eight seconds left in the half at the seventeen yard line of Cincinnati Man I obviously not on the same page whatsoever quarterback and receivers. I mean, he just throws that ball up the return with seventy eight yards and with eight seconds left down the clock. Was there any doubt what was going to happen? Next shotgun

snap Breeze drops back from the twenty five. His pass caught over the middle for a touchdown for Michael Thomas, and the Saints are running away and hiding here at Paul Brown Stadium thirty five seven New Orleans at the half. Last week, the Saints scored thirty five points in the first half against the previously unbeaten Rams. So I guess we shouldn't have been shocked when they did it to

the Bengals. Here's Preston Brown. I mean, they got great weapons, but they just have so much confidence in what they do. I mean, they run in Preston own and out. They know the plays extremely well. They have a quarterback who's been back there for twenty years, so everybody knows that they're doing and they play extremely fast. Can you describe the frustration level right now? Oh? Is that all time high for me? Amount never seeing anything like it me

every week? Is just we've given him two many yards. I mean, I gotta look at myself and find a way to help this team because I need to play a lot better if we're gonna be better on defense. After scoring touchdowns on all five of their possessions in the first half, the Saints settled for a field goal the first time they got the ball in the third quarter before scoring another touchdown on possession number seven. Saints are going to go for it on fourth down and

goal inches away from the Bengals goal line. Drew Brees jumps up, extends the ball with two hands. How many times have we seen him do that over the years. It's a New Orleans touchdown. Drew Brees finished twenty for twenty five for two hundred and sixty five yards, three passing touchdowns, one rushing touchdown, and a passer rating of one fifty point four. A perfect score is one fifty eight point three. Here's linebacker Jordan Evans. I mean they

got a great quarterback. Yeah, great running back, right, we see. You know, they're good, great off of the line. They're just a good team and they do what they do very very well. So even though they you know, we prepare for it, they still just they out execute us. And that's what it was. It was forty five seven going to the fourth quarter. In the Saints kept scoring,

kicking field goals on their eighth and ninth possessions. The only time all day that New Orleans didn't score was on their tenth and final possession, when they ran out the final four forty two off the clock. The Bengals did add a late touchdown, the first ever scored in a regular season game by backup quarterback Jeff Driscoll zone read Driscoll keep laft racing of the twenty in the tenth to five touchdown. Jeff Driscoll, he kept it on a zone read on fourth down in the yard and

runs twenty seven yards for his first NFL touchdown. About that, the final score fifty one fourteen. Here's Tyler Boyd man it hurt. It definitely hurt. You know, guys might not show that, but to me, it hurt. I hate to lose, especially like that. We got to flat out e bears, you know, And that's not a laws that I ever want to take. You know, that's that's high school school us man. We're the top athletes here, so we got

to show that. Now, time for some numbers. The fifty one points allowed were one off the team record, and it's the most ever allowed in a home game. The Saints finished with five hundred nine yards of offense, making the Bengals the first team in the Super Bowl era to allow five hundred or more yards in three straight games. Cincinnati is on a pace to surrender five hundred twelve points this year. The franchise record is four sixty. So

how do they fix it? Here's Michael Johnson. You know, whatever is being called, we have to go ask them. Well they you know, that's what they pay us well to go out and do what we what we asked to do and do it well. So we need to do it better. We just gotta do our job better. Like you do your job for four to eight plays and then you decide for the nine. So you know, you're gonna do your own thing. It can hurt us, you know, And we gotta leven guys. So eleven guy

gotta do exactly what they coach should do. Play in and play out to the best of the ability, because we can't make corrections if we're not well we're supposed to be. Despite the thirty seven point loss to the Saints and the thirty five point loss to the Chiefs a few weeks ago, the five and four Bengals are still at least for now, the sixth and final playoff seed in the AFC Up. Next the road game at Baltimore. Here are Preston Brown and Marvin Lewis. We still got

a lot of division games to play. We got to go to Baltimore and get a big win. We don't know who quarterback is going to be, but we gotta find a way to get a big win and shake this rust off because we can't keep giving a five hundred yards and expect the offense to score fifty if we can't get anything. So we gotta get better. We gotta correct, we gotta get into right spots. We got to do it with the right people, and we got

to make sure we understand it. We got an opportunity again next week against Baltimore to put ourselves right back where we need to be. Now, time to bring in my broadcast partner Dave Lapham for postgame analysis. At this point, with seven games left in the regular season, the Bengals defense is historically bad. On a pace to give up the most yards in NFL history, on a pace to give up the most points in Bengals history, is the

reason for hope that it can get considerably better. First time in NFL history a team has given up five hundred yards and more. But you look at the teams, you know, you get well, Pittsburgh was four to eighty, but you know, Kansas City has a good football team. Tampa Bay is a good offensive football team. The Staints team might be as good as Kansas City or better. I mean, who knows. They're both. They're both dynamic in how they do it schematically, personnel motions, formations, I mean,

it's crazy. They get defensive eyes going the wrong direction, the wrong way. They just really make defensive players uncomfortable with all the speed and all the It's like you know rush hour in Manhattan, that what's going on out there and it's hard to sort through and guys get out of position, and you know, you got to hope that when they play teams that don't have that warped speed,

you know, Baltimore doesn't necessarily Cleveland doesn't. And you start to get players back, you know, like like Vontz Perfect, like like Darcuz Denard, you know, like Nick Vigil. You start to get some bodies back for this, you know, two game little stretch run in the division. It could could have an impact, could have a significance. So I don't think that Baltimore's offense and Cleveland's offense are gonna pulls anywhere near the kind of problems that you know,

Kansas City Post in New Orleans post. So there is there is hope. But everybody be where you're supposed to be. Hit the gap you're supposed to hit. Don't freelance, trust what you're supposed to do and do it and see what happens. But man, that was a hot knife through butter. That was very, very frustrating about You know, if you're a punter, you don't letter punning the football, but you hold on nine placements between touchdowns and field goals. So you're in the game for nine snaps. As a holder,

it's a very frustrating day. When you get half a Hondy hung on you, it's very frustrating. It's only happened five times in Bengals history. When you give up fifty one, you're not going to win the game. But the offense is responsible for how ugly today's game went as well. They went right down the field and scored a touchdown on a seventy five yard drive with five first downs to begin the game, and then until the touchdown at the end by Jeff driscoll that made the final score

a tiny bit more respective. The offense did not play well at all, no question, Dan. On that touchdown, you're describing eight plays, five runs, three passes, Andy Dalton's three for three throws a touchdown pass. They don't get the third down, They do all their damage on first and second down. Thing of beauty. And then when they did get the third down, over six because it's third and long. I mean New Orleans converted their first seven third downs.

They were third and one, third and two, third and three. In other words, third and short. The Bengals weren't third and short. The Bengals were third and four are longer on every third down opportunity except for one. And you know that's that's where you have issues. And you know, that first drive, I don't know, I guess what was it,

fool's goals. I don't know what it was, but I mean, you know, at that point, I'm not sure if it was any adjustments New Orleans made or just the fact that you know, and I agree with your comment during the game when you said, you know, when you punt in a game like this, it's almost like a turnover, and you know it is you start to feel like now you feel an additional pressure. Man, they scored again. We punted, they scored again. We got to do something

this time. So now all of a sudden, you know, the vice starts tightening on you and you start doing things you shouldn't do. So, yeah, you get caught in that spiral, that big vortex, big whirlpool. It's just going to take you right down to the you know, the tide is there's a riptide out there, and you can't swim fast enough, you know, and it starts just pulling

it down. My advice to the Bengals avoid social media for the next twenty four to forty eight hours and try to get back on track for a divisional game on the road against Baltimore. Two division games in a row on the road against Baltimore and then Cleveland here, mega games, mega football games. They're one and one in the division right now. This is not even a conference loss. You know, I don't want to pooh pooh it. I mean,

I get the smoked it's not. I didn't expect them, honestly to beat the Saints, but I didn't expect him to get blown out by thirty seven points and have fifty one hung on him at home. You know, on the road against Kansas City is one thing, but at home at Paul Brown Stadium, I just didn't expect that. I expected a high score in football game, but only

one team was the high scoring team. Again, you know, right now, they're like minus sixty and they have a winning record, and they're minus sixty and points scored and points against because of two blowouts Kansas City in this football game against the Saints. So it is only one loss though, Dan, you know, and you mentioned it a while back. Buffalo had two blowouts and went nine to seven and made the playoffs. When the Bengals knocked the

Ravens out. This is their second blowout. Will they be able to respond and recover, you know, and get the job done against a couple of division opponents division rivals, We'll see. That's a big test. They'd better be up for it. Thanks Lap for what it's worth. If the season ended today, the six seated Bengals would open the

postseason at New England Serenity. Now, speaking of New England, it's time for this week's fun facts segment, as you get to know the person under the pads, in this case a Bengals tight end who earned a Super Bowl ring with the Patriots. Time for some fun facts at Bengals tight end Matt Lengal from Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, not too far from the state capital of Harrisburg. Mechanicsburg, Pa. Might be the most blue collar sounding name I've ever heard?

Is that about right? Yeah? Yeah, I'd say it's about right. You know. It's really a small town, kind of situated within a bunch of other towns, you know, like you said, not too far away from Harrisburg. And literally it's a settlement of mechanics back you know, I think pre Civil War era so that name means exactly how it sounds. So your dad was a police officer. You often tweet your respect for police officers. What was it like growing up the sign of a police officer and how much

love and respect you have for what he did? Oh my gosh, I mean, it's it's truly, it's not until you get older, you know, where you start to realize, where you start to have a family of your own. And you know, I don't have any kids yet, but you know, I have a wife, and I have a house, and I have responsibilities and a job. And you know, it's not until I get older that I realized that every day he leaves the door, you know, you don't

know if, truly if he's coming back. And then he was on the SWAT team for you know, seventeen or eighteen years, and you know, so some days he would be dropped, I mean, off of football and his his beeper would ring and he'd have to go, and he'd have to you know, he might not be back until the next morning at six am, and and again you don't know if he's leaving. But as a little kid, I don't think I, you know, truly realized, you know, at that age your you know, your dad's superman. You know,

you don't anticipate anything bad happening to him. My Twitter, I try to draw as much you know, respect I can, you know, towards you know, men and women of law enforcement, because as a son of a police officer, I understand, you know, what their family goes through. Um, and you know, I can't imagine, you know, being one of those people that, um, you know, their mother or dad didn't come home. So

you'll see me retweet that stuff. And you know, sometimes unfortunately, uh, you know, you'll scroll through my page and that might be the only thing you see for a couple of thumb swipes. Uh. But um, you know, it's just something that's important to me, and it's something I want people to, you know, constantly be aware of. Is that you know, these men and women are you know, they're superheroes too. I mean, they're unbelievable people that chose that life and

chose that occupation. So I think they deserve all the respect that we can give them. Amen to that. We're doing fun facts with Matt Lengel. You started out at Northeastern in Boston, and then after one year they dropped football. Did you have any inkling that might happen or was it a total shock? It was a total shock. That was my only scholarship coming out of high school. So I went there. Um, I was all bought in, you know,

I wanted to give him everything I had. And you know, it was the day after our last game and they pulled us into the women's lock or the women's gymnasium, women's basketball gymnasium, and you know, they told us, you know,

they're dropping the program. And it was it was scary because you know, like I said, that was my only scholarsh so I didn't know what was next, and you know, so disappointed myself because I love football, and you know, I was just you know, maybe if I would have gone somewhere, you know, that had a better program, you

know that, you know, this wouldn't be happening Orum. And then actually the you know it's funny now, but Hofstra was actually at the school they offered me the next day and they dropped their football program a week later. So you know, for a while, I was like, man, the football gods are not happy with me right now. But you know, after you know a couple of weeks, a couple of strenuous, stressful weeks. Um, you know, I got multi I got a few scholarship offers, and ultimately

I decided to go to Eastern Kentucky. You went from Northeastern to Eastern Kentucky and suffered serious knee injuries in back to back seasons. How did you overcome that? Truthfully? You know, one of the first things I did was just give thanks to God. That seems odd, you know that I would you know, in that situation, I would just give thanks, but uh, you know, it just it happened. You know, it just almost just came out of my mouth, like I'm just gonna choose to be thankful. I'm gonna

choose to trust the plan. I'm gonna I'm gonna choose to just trust the you know that God had a plan for me and that you know, things were going to work out, and that my belief and Him and Jesus was gonna lead me to places that I wanted to be. Um, So, you know, truthfully, that's what I

did in those situations. And then you know, once the surgery came and you know I got that, and um, you know, I just was determined to take all that energy I was putting into football and then just put it into my rehab im and put it into other

areas of my life. So actually my grades were better you know once I was you know, rehabbing, and you know, my rehab went really well, you know, thankfully, and just because all that energy, you know, sometimes I tried to I just tried to stay away from, you know, feeling sorry for myself because that's a dangerous place to be

and I think as an athlete. Um, so I just you know, transitioned all that energy into rehab, into school, into my relationship with now my wife, and you know, it wasn't a bad experience, you know, as tragic as it, you know, as it might seem. I think it's something I look back on. I'm thankful that happened to me because I think, you know, ultimately, let me hear, we're doing fun facts with bad Lengal. You signed with the Bengals as a college free agent in twenty fifteen, spent

that year on the practice squad. What did that year do for your development? Oh? I think it was very important because you know, coming out undrafted, you know, with those injuries from a small school. You know, the game, the game was a lot quicker, and I think it just it gave me time to understand how to be a professional. Really, because you know, that first year I was I was almost two hundred and seventy five pounds. I just wanted to be as big and strong as possible.

And then after a couple while, you know, after a little while and a couple of weeks, and you just kind of figure out that, like, all right, this isn't the best way, and my body doesn't feel the best that I can, and so it just kind of gave me time. It was almost like getting red shirted. It just gave me time to become a professional and understand

what works and what doesn't work. And some guys would look at the practice squad as you know, you weren't the first overall draft pick, you know, with a thirty million dollars signing bonus. But at the same time, it was, you know, just another opportunity. Like I said, I just tried to learn how to become a professional. Watch guys, you know, things guys do well, things guys don't do well, and just kind of, you know, put the pieces together.

And then I think, you know, now, I think I haven't figured out now I just gotta, you know, continue to get better. There's always things to improve. So I'm not saying that, but there's always things to improve. But I think, you know, I'm at a good place. I guess a few more fun facts with Matt Langel. So, in your second season on the Bengals practice squad, the

team goes off to London. A week eight, you come back from London and out of the blue, the Patriots sign you off the practice squad and just like that, you're playing one days for the Patriots. It seemed like a shock to me at the time. I can only imagine when it was like for you. Yeah, yeah, it was. It was crazy. You know, it was just kind of

a whirlwind. Um. You know, one day you're you know, working on the scout team, and then one day you got to be expected to know everything and and be able to perform for a team that you know was doing well, and you know you don't want to screw that up for anybody. So in a team that you know demands a lot. And then once I got there, I was watching the game in my first game, there is when grunt got hurt. You know a lot of

people kind of get it backwards. They think Grunt got hurt and then they signed me, But no, I was in the I was in the stands there the practice squad or the and active guys aren't even on the sidelines there in the stands, So I was in the stands and Grunt got hurt and I just kind of like looked at myself. I was like, all right, you know it's just me and Martelli's Bennett now, So I guess I got the time has come. So I just you know, i'd studied the playbook as hard as I can,

like I'm doing now because you know, it's a similar situation. Um. You know, coming in half with through a year to learn a playbook is not easy, but it's you know, it can be done. So you know, just trying to do that as as much as possible right now. And yeah, when I when I had to do that back then too, it was it was the first time, so it was a little bit more stressful. So I got through it.

Tom Brady recently said an NFL record by throwing a touchdown pass to a seventy first different receiver, and you're on that list. Your first NFL catch Christmas Eve two thousand and sixteen eighteen yard catch from Tom Brady. I went back and watched the footage today. Your teammates went nuts.

They were really excited for you. What was that moment, Like, I mean, it was I wish I had a cool touchdown celebration, but uh, it was you know when I when I did it, I stood up and I realized I just was so I mean, it was just a dream, you know, come true, that kind of thing. And it was you know, I was just glad to be there, you know, when called upon, and to be able to

execute my job and do it well. And you know, for you know those kind of guys that you know, like Tom and you know like Julian and like all those guys that are there that are you know, great competitors and great athletes. You know, just in that moment, you know, if that was my moment to you know, the ball was coming to me, and you know, I just want to be able to deliver and catch the ball, you know, That's all. Like, that's all I was thinking,

is just catch the ball. You ended that year by playing in the Super Bowl and the greatest come from behind victory and Super Bowl history from twenty eight to three to a Super Bowl win over the Falcons. What's your biggest memory of that day? Man? You know, it was kind of neat, you know, even you know before that, you know, my family we had picture day of the day before and my family was all out there and we were all just staying there and kind of mingling

for a while. My parents and my wife and my brother had flown in and they were all staying there watching, you know, we're taking the pictures and everything. And then I mean, honestly, the Super Bowl was it was such a big moment, in such a crazy moment that it's you know, some of the moments that are tough to even remember, you know, actually if I saw it in person.

But I think one of the things is that I still to this day think about, is I've there's never I've never seen as many people at a game that then there were there. It was it was it was brighter, it was the colors were more vivid, like it was just bizarre. But you know, the the amount of people that were on the sidelines. You'd look over and there would just be i mean countless celebrities on the sidelines, or you know, you look up and there'd be like

the NFL Network thing. You know, the booth and the lights from that are shining in, and you know, just people filing in. I mean, it's like pregame and there's already the stands are already filled almost just because people want to see the Super Bowl teams warm up. Like it was. It was definitely the most electric environment I've ever been in. And when we won, they crossed the goal line and it was like, holy crap, we actually made this thing work. You know that was and guy

started storming the field and the confetti starts falling. It was just like I almost was like looking around in disbelief just because you know, it was I and I played it like it was. It was crazy. So it was cool. Um marked that off the bucket list. Trying to get another one. That sounds good to me. Absolutely. All right, we're wrapping this up. I'm bringing it full circle back to Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. You are not the only

successful person from Mechanicsburg. The lead singer of Poison, Brett Michaels, is from your hometown. Do you have any good Brett Michaels mechanics Burg stories. Yeah, my mom's best friend dated him. Yeah, true story. Yeah, true story. My mom, my mom's best

friend growing up. They're still you know, friends of this day, and you know they often talked about, Yeah, they used to go down in the basement and you know watch Brett Michaels in their band at that time playing they My mom was I say, yo, wait, and we didn't think they were very good. You know, we were like, all right, you guys play that. We just go watch them. But yeah, my mom's best friend, David Brett Michael's back in college and apparently their band wasn't very good, but

now they are. They got better. Yeah, they got better. Apparently. That's awesome. Hey, this has been great. Really appreciate your time. Best of LUFT the rest of the year. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. And that's going to do it for this episode of the podcast. If you haven't done so already, don't forget to subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher, or pod Bean and give it a rating or leave a comment. Your feedback has been awesome and five star

ratings help more Bengals fans find this podcast. I'm Dan Horde, and thanks for listening to The Bengals Booth Podcast.