Bengals Booth Podcast: Tomorrow

the Lombardi Trophy. Then we'll spend a few minutes with the great Kevin Harland, who will broadcast the Super Bowl on radio for the twelfth consecutive year for Westwood One. The Bengals Booth Podcast is presented by Ultimate Bengals, the free to play Next Level Fantasy Football game, downloaded now from the app Store and Google Play and by on Location, the official hospitality partner of the NFL. Visit on Location exp dot com for exclusive access to the bigest events

in the NFL, including the Super Bowl. 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 wherever you get your podcasts. It's the greatest thing since kids dressing like Joe Burrow. I can't get enough of the pictures on social media of little kids, in some cases infants wearing rose colored Cardier knockoff sunglasses or

black turtlenecks with homemade JB nine fake diamond necklaces. Chad Johnson helped make Cincinnati cool in the early two thousands, and Joey franchise has certainly done it again. He has the effortless cool of Joe Namath. But let's hope he doesn't do any ads for pantyhose. Look it up, kids. Now let's get to my guests, beginning with Bengals president

Mike Brown. Mike prefers to stay in the background and allow the attention to go to his coaches and players, but he was kind enough to visit with me before the Bengals traveled to Los Angeles. Mike, football has been your life personally and professionally. Can you articulate what this Super Bowl trip means to you. It's very satisfying. Our team came together and we've had a string of amazingly close games. They were exciting. We prevailed in four of them.

Really to get to this point twice against Kansas City the first one here, and we had to win that one to win the division and get into the playoffs. And just as pleased as it's possible to be if you're in my position, this is what your goal is in life, and here we are. We have a chance to win the big one, and that would be great if we could pull it off. But it's an exciting time for me and for all the people here with the Bengals. At what point did you think that this

team could be a contender. Well, Joe Burrow makes you think you can win any game that you go into, and we have amazing whiteouts. We've got three guys that are just tremendous. That gives us a live offense. These days in the NFL, the goal is to score thirty points or more. That's what you need to win it. You can even lose it that figure, but if you can get there with enough defense to go with it, you'll prevail. And we did Noise get there. We did

Noise prevail. But as we went along, our confidence built because you could see we could play with anybody. And then we got to the point where we were winning these close games. And here we are. We'll see what happens next. But this is a good group of players, a good group of people, and they look forward to see what happens out in La Mike. When your father's Cleveland Browns are winning championships, his quarterback was autogram the

Tom Brady of his era, winning seven championships. It does Joe Burrow remind you of Autograham in any way they compete. They just performed best when the pressure is greatest. And remember having utter confidence in autogramm it. Somehow, some way he would get us where we needed to go. And the same is true with Joe. Joe finds the way and the players believe in him here, just as the old Browns players believe in Otto. They thought that they

were going to do it. They had confidence, and Otto was the one that instilled that, just as Joe does with our guys these days. I don't know if you've ever seen the movie Jerry McGuire, but there's a cheesy line in it where the female character says to Tom Cruise, the sports agent, you had me at hello when you met with Joe Burrow at the NFL scouting combine? Did he have you at hello? He was focused and he

wasn't very interested in small talk. Zach did some football discussion with him then and at another time as well, I think, and you perked up when you saw him and how he conducted him. So he has a air about him that calls for respect. When he came here, he earned that. Everyone believes in him here. That's what

you want from your quarterback. After clinching the AFC North, Zach Taylor gave you and your wife Nancy a game ball and said if he was working for a different owner, he probably would not have had a third year as the head coach. What did you see that gave you confidence that Zach ultimately would be successful. He's organized, he's a good person, He's knowledgeable about football. He was young

and went through some things. But quite honestly, we were injured the year with Joe and the team was injured, and that was what set us back more than anything. But you could see the basic structure was what I hope for. He knows the passing game and that's where the NFL is these days, and he teams well with Joe. They both believe in each other. I never thought that there was any question that he was capable of doing this. So it's off to Super Bowl fifty six in Los Angeles.

Do you typically attend the Super Bowl? I used to. I'm old now and so I don't. I have in recent years had to get together with a group of friends and we sit and watch and have a nice time at home. Here Katie has taken over. She goes to the Super Bowl. I've seen that stick and it's quite amazing. It's fun, but I've done it enough times that I'm ready to hand it off to I covered a Super Bowl years ago where Marvel Levy, the Buffalo Bills coach, refused to pose for a picture with a

Lombardi Trophy before the game. He thought it was bad luck. Have you ever held the Lombardi Trophy? No? Have you dreamed of that moment where the commissioner hands you the Lombardi Trophy after a Bengal Super Bowl win? Oh? I don't dream of such things. Yes, I know that's what you would like to have happened, but I don't have

night thoughts along those slides. I didn't live here in nineteen eighty one or nineteen eighty eight, but Dave Lapham has described for me what the city was like when the Bengals who are going to those two Super Bowls. What does it meant to you to see the city of Cincinnati and this area gets so excited about this team. This is a wonderful moment for me. What our goal

is winning on the field. That's how you get to the next goal, which is to excite the city and get our supporters feeling happy about how it's going, enjoying it, getting involved in the ways they do. That for me is a real treat. I am enjoying that part of it as much as anything. Tyler Boyd recently described how much he appreciates you attending every practice, regardless of the weather,

regardless of the circumstances. You are always there, and he went on to say he enjoys going over and as he put it, chopping it up with you, having brief conversations with you. What did those interactions with the players mean to you. Well, as I've gotten older, I know our players less well. I watched them. Tyler's one I still get to talk to occasionally, and I appreciate the fact that he comes over and treats me as buddy,

if you will, for a moment or two. It's fun and once upon a time, I knew all the guys I had. I signed them all every year I did that, and they were on a first name basis with me from those days. These days a lot of them want to call me mister Brown, and that's that puts me a notice of where I am in life. But it's fun to watch them. I have nothing that I would prefer to do more than sit and watch the team practice.

They're remarkable athletes. I enjoy the passing game. I enjoy watching the offensive line and the defensive line when they get together. It. Oh, it's just for me. What is the thing I like to do best. Some people rather play golf, some people collect stamps. I don't know that. This for me is all that and more, and it's what I want to do and I'm lucky to have it. You'd rather be on a golf cart next to the practice field than on a beach in Acapulco. Well, I'd

rather be out with the players. I would. I don't have anything any desire and to be an Alcapolco, But I believe I'm very happy with what my lot is. I feel fortunate, and the weather is the weather. I just accept that part of it. In some ways makes it more interesting because it presents challenges and that's sort of fun to see how that can be handled. The NFL is big business, but it remains family business in Cincinnati. You are experiencing this with your son, your daughter, your

son in law, two of your granddaughters. Does that add to how meaningful this whole experience is? Oh, it was my goal to be able to do this. My father didn't. I've been involved with this as his assistant and then really for a while with him and his older days. I had a big role in it. Really that wasn't recognized outside of here. And now it's gone to where I ran it to where now I am passing it on to Katie and Paul and Troy and the girls

Elizabeth and Caroline. They're smart, they work hard, they like it, and it's the point now where I have to learn to shut up more. What do you think your father would think of the twenty twenty one Cincinnati Bengals. He would have liked this team. This was his kind of team, and we're wide open. We get some remarkable plays on offense, we have a defense that is solid, we have a lot of pieces. Maybe we won't prevail every time out. But believe me, they'll know they had to go and

this team can play with anybody. This was his dream fifty four years ago when he bought professional football to Cincinnati, for the Bengals to be Super Bowl champions. Is that part of the motivation for you to realize his vision? Honestly, I don't think of it in those terms. I think of it as to what it means for the people here. That's what pleases me. I enjoy seeing them celebrate and have fun. One of the things that was just first

straight for me. After the game in Kansas City, or we won the way we did, I was out in the parking lot on the bus. I go with the players on the bus and I'm sitting there watching and they're interacting with their families and their children, And for me, that was about as good a time as I could have. I didn't do anything except watch to see them feeling good about themselves and how it had gone. That was

what made me happy. Well, I share your happiness over the excitement of Bengals fans, but I'm really happy for you, and I truly hope that we all get to see you holding that Lombardi Trophy. After a Bengal Super Bowl win over the Rams. Thank you so much for your time. Congratulations on this great season. Best of luck on Super Bowl Sunday. Thanks Dan. A Bengal Booth podcast is presented by Ultimate Bengals, the free to play fantasy football game.

This year, Ultimate Bengals awarded a weekly winner during the course of the season with tickets, autograph merchandise, and money can't buy experiences all up for grabs. Find Ultimate Bengals in the App Store and Google Play and buy on Location, the official hospitality partner of the NFL. Visit on location exp dot com for exclusive access to the biggest events, including the Super Bowl. My sportscasting hero was a guy

named Van Miller. He was the voice of the Buffalo Bills for more than forty years and in two thousand and four became the first local play by play announcer to be honored by the Pro Football Hall of Fame. I've always considered Van to be the greatest football announcer on the radio of all time, but now I think two people share that title, Van Miller and Kevin Harlan.

Harlan will call the Super Bowl on the radio for Westwood One for the twelfth consecutive year, and he joined Dave Lapham and me for a few minutes on Friday's Bengals pep Rally show, and Dave good to be on with you guys. How Sponnie is this? I had a terrific for you're sitting and for the team, and for you two guys in particular I know and respect so much. I'm so happy for you. And the weather's great. I think Sunday is going to be a great day as well.

And I managed just to watch that one unfold. So, Kevin, you had the Bengals multiple times during the season. How surprised are you that they're in Super Bowl fifty six? Well, you know, I kind of saw them at their best and their worst. I saw them, you know, win on the road in the division and look commanding doing it.

And then I saw him in New York against the Jets and Trent Green and I had that game and that's when that first time starter at four hundred plus through the air, and the Bengals, I think, going into that game, if I'm not mistaken, were the number one team in the AFC. They were like five and two, does ent sound about right? And there were number one in the AFC, and we came on that day talking about, you know, can they handle success? And as it turns out,

you know, here they are, but you can't help. But that teams like that, the way it turned out, and the responsibility of being in the position of being the hunted and not the hunter, and they were being the hunted even then, you know, has helped shape them and made them the team they are right now. It's never perfect, there are always flaws, but that season told the story

and the team grew. I think from that loss, they won, you know, from that point on, and they really collected themselves and certainly the rest is history, not the least of which was the big winned Arrowhead a couple of weeks ago. So I always think that all the things that go through as people and teams always builds to what we become in those days. As tough as they were at times, they made the Bengals what they are right now. In my good are they a good team?

Only they are right now? They were my dark horse from the beginning of the fourteen teams in because we saw them five times on CBS. I thought I watched their defense, I knew how they played. I saw the quarterback. I knew how he played. We saw the three elite receivers in the thousand yard back, and we saw the developing offensive line and the continuity that was being traced game by games, So we knew the story. I think they kind of sprung themselves by surprise in the rest

of the country, but not us. We knew, we saw, and we've enjoyed it, and I'm thrilled that they're here. Our guest is Kevin Harland. He will call the super Bowl for Westwood one with former Super Bowl winning quarterback and this is a tremendous quarterback matchup Joe Burrow Matthew Stafford, very different stages of their career. How big a part of the storyline is that? In your opinion, Kevin, I

think Joe is the singular story headline. I think that to me, I mean, you could look at eighteen thousand different things we could start talking about, you know, the matchup of Rams and whoever heat covers and handling Aaron Donald or you know all these different things. Well, the secondary hold against the past. Stafford can the Corral Cooper Cup. But to me, if you're going to pick one, and that's kind of what we're all being asked here in the last couple of days. To me, it will be

Joe's escapability. His ability to run an arrowhead against the Chiefs, I thought was monumental, and I thought that, you know, with the rush that he's going to get and it will be fierce all day long. And for the offensive line, which is still in developing stages and still trying to get its footing, although allowed only one sack against the Chiefs, that is going to be the battle. Will he have enough time to let the receivers run their routes and if he doesn't, is he able to escape and buy

more time? And if he has more time, can he complete the throw or does he have to do it with his own running ability? And I think he can do all of it. I think he can run what he wants. I think he can throw any wants. He's so smart. And the intangible from a distance is to watch his leadership and his calm, because I think that really, you know, puts the hand on the rudder for the team. I think they react the way he reacts in his look and his demeanor is everything for that ball club.

Our thanks to Kevin Harland and that's going to do it for this episode of the Bengals Booth Podcast, brought to you by Ultimate Bengals, the free to play next level Fantasy football game, and by on Location, the official hospitality partner of the NFL. If you haven't done so already, please subscribe to this podcast, and if you have a minute, give it a rating or share a comment that helps more Bengals fans find us. I'm Dan Horde, and thanks for listening to The Bengals Booth Podcast