Bengals Booth Podcast: Winner Takes It All

broadcast partner Dave Lapham. Then, in this week's fun Fact segment, you'll get to know wide receiver slash return specialist Trent Taylor. 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 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 delivering game balls to fans following the games. Zach Taylor announced the start of a new tradition. Following playoff wins, the Bengals will drop off game balls at bars around the city. So that fans can hold them, take pictures with them, etc. On Saturday night, balls were dropped off at Pontiac and over the Rhine, while titching

post in Northern Kentucky and Mount Lookout Tavern. You can find footage of Zach and Kevin Huber dropping off a ball at MLTS on Twitter. It was the perfect way to say thank you to the record crowd that filled the Jungle on Saturday. It was loud enough at times to wake the dead. Now let's get to the game. The Raiders got the ball first and immediately scored, as a forty seven yard field goal by Daniel Carlson made it three nothing, but the Bengals answered with a ten

play seventy five yard drive. Greens into mix charging to the thirty new roles to the twenty fifteen down to the ten Joe Mixon twenty one yards on the screen and its first in goal. Three plays later. The Bengals took a lead they never relinquished. Burrow catches a shotgun snap drops back guns in Indian zone into a thick years for the touchdown. See jay U Sama in the middle of defenders palling in that line. Drive throw from Joe Burrow and c j Uzama basically acting like a

power forward. He's boxing people out. Uzama followed his touchdown by combining the Ikey shuffle with Jamar Chase's gritty dance. Well, I knew that Ikey woods would be the rule of the jungle. And I was like, oh nice, I'll just I'll just do the key shuffle. Um, And I was talking. I was talking to one of my boys, and I was like, yo, if I score, I'm gonna do the Ikey into They're gritty And he said not if win.

And I was like, all right, bet Um. I probably should have practiced for sure, because that was that was not that was not well done. But come the end zone, screw it. The Bengals had a seven three lead, and roughly two minutes later, the defense got the ball back. Car stomps the right foot, catches a chest high snap, drops back seven steps hit from it comes out scooped

up bygon Joe Bas Hendricksons with a striped sack. Hen the Bengals will take over half the fifteen half Las Vegas, the Bengals drove to the eight before settling for a field goal in a ten three lead. Hendrickson sack led to three points, and on the first play of the second quarter, Sam Hubbard almost added two more car back to throw from the golden Yeah he's put down, you're gonna say he was just outside of the end zone

by a half a yard. Car was eventually down in the end zone by Hill and Hubbard, but when contact was made he was just past the goal line. The Raiders had to punt from the back of the end zone, giving the Bengals a great drive start at the Las Vegas forty five. A twenty eight yard pass to Jamar Chase helped them drive to the four, but the Bengals stalled in the red zone again. Burrow waits at the nine,

catches the shotgun snap pump fakes in trouble. Burrow spun to the ground and then two Raiders jump on top of them. After that, the sack goes back to the twelve yard line. Burrow hops up trots toward the sideline. Max Crosby got to him first. Well one for three. Now in the red zone. Evan McPherson's field goal made

it thirteen three. The Raiders answered with a field goal to pull back within seven, and the Bengals came back with their best drive of the day, an eighty two yard march that included a great call on fourth and one. Cabals on the left hash Now Burrow moves under center, Chase motions into the backfield. They toss it to Jamar Chase twenty to the twenty five, the twenty the fifteen he's taken out of bounds. A creative play design has Chase motions into the backfield and carries like a running

back to convert on fourth and one. Why not, He's spectacular in space. It was another brilliant performance by Numero Uno. Nine catches for one hundred and sixteen yards and three runs for twenty three more. I haven't played running back in a long time, but you know they've given me those tosses. AGIN must be the outside getting hit by linebackers. I'll know how it hits filled again. But you know, as cool as long as I can make a play with the bottom minds. That fifteen yard run on fourth

down led to the bengals second touchdown. Joe Burrow is ready, Hopkins snaps it back. Burrow drops back to throw, looking rolling out to the right. Still looking downfield, Burrow throws it towards the back ten zone, boy leaps, he makes the gatrill. Did Burrow stay in bounds? Money through it? The officials are talking about it on the Bengals sideline.

Joe Burrow holding up his arms signaling touchdown, and the officials are going to have a lengthy discussion to see if Joe got the ball out of his hands before stepping out a bout. They should call it a touchdown. That the touchdown, then it's automatically reviewed. Call it a touchdown, then they automatically review it. Nope, dope. I don't understand why the delay. Here's why. The real issue wasn't whether Burrow was still in bounds, It was whether the play

should have been blown dead by an inadvertent whistle. NFL Senior VP of Officiating Walt Anderson told Pool reporter Paul Dayner Junior after the game that the officials on the field determined that the whistle came after Boyd's touchdown catch. That wasn't the case. If you listen closely to replays, you can hear the whistle just before Boyd caught it. Fortunately for the Bengals, that decision cannot be reversed on replay. Having said that the whistle had nothing to do with

a fantastic play by Burrow. Yeah, that's what you expect from the numb one picking the draft is up plays like that. Plays you can't explain making a play when there's no play to be made. That's a phrase I've heard often to my career, and Joe Burrows a kind of guy that can make those touches of plays, and it's pretty impressive. The Bengals were up by two touchdowns, but as the Raiders demonstrated by winning four straight half to have at games at the end of the year,

they're hard to kill. Car dropping back to pass fires into the end zone. Say Jones pulls it down for a touchdown with thirteen seconds left and the half. The Bengals took a knee to end the half. They're only drive in the first two quarters where they didn't score, and yet they were only up by seven. Cincinnati got the ball to begin the third and drove far enough

to add three points and another McPherson field goal. Those are the only points of the third quarter, as the Bengals took a twenty three to thirteen lead to the fourth. The Raiders cut into it on Daniel Carlson's third field goal of the game to make it twenty three to sixteen, But after punting on their previous drive for the first time all day, the Bengals answered with a seven and a half minute march all the way down to the

Raiders ten. On fourth and one, they lined up to go for it before calling time out and attempting a field goal. Huber Catches puts it down Nick Pearson's kick on its way and good wow. The Bengals lead by ten. With six minutes and forty six seconds remaining. Red zone has been the twilight zone for the Bengals. Another field goal. They settled for two touchdowns, three field goals not good enough. It was just tough, tough for me to find a rhythm there, to be quite honest with you, to get

us into the best stuff. And you know, disappointing because we scored on our first five drives of the game, but like you said, it didn't feel like we had enough points on the board, and I just put that on more than me just just finding about the rhythm there in the low red zone. With four and a half minutes left, the Bengals defense had a chance to basically put the game away. Fourth thousand and five for the Raiders. Car in the shotgun rechhard to his left,

three receivers left, one right, car back to throw. I'm fourth and five, has time throws Jackson with a catch at the Cincinnati thirty three, and he sprints out of bounds at the thirty to stop the clock with a fourth and five conversion that led to a field goal that made it a seven point game. The Bengals offense could not put the game away as they failed to get a first down and punted it back to the Raiders with one fifty one to go. Zach Taylor says

he was confident that his defense would come through. I promise you my heart rate was as even as could be, just because I trust our players. I knew that someone was gonna step up and win that game for us, and wasn't surprised when it happened. He was right, and the player who stepped up was Jermaine Pratt. Fourth down end goal from the nine seventeen seconds to go to play clock at three shotgun snap car throws in the traffic n interceptence. Jermaine prats the football coffin now Samamam

how about that. It ends on a turnover. Here's Pratt. I'm making one of the biggest defensive plays in team history. It means a lot. You know, um, I got drafted by Zach You know we had ups and downs for the past two years and be able to make that play, you know, put a stamp of the first class he draft ever here had the best. It was a great opportunity. I think Jermaine has made a really big step this year. I thought last year was a good step in year

two for him. I think this year he's made a tremendous jump and super reliable for us and just as consistent as there is. If Patt had simply knocked the ball down, the end result would have been the same. After the game, he was asked why an interception means more than a pass deflection? Do you mean why do you want to turn on him, turn on his wing games? I want a peak. I don't want to peep you. The Bengals were one snap away from a moment the

Bengals fans have been waiting for for three decades. Choe Burrow takes the snap, he takes a knee, and after thirty one years, the drought is over and guess what. The Joe Purrow era is just beginning, no doubt about it. The final score twenty six nineteen. Here are Sam Hubbard, Joe Burrow, and Zach Taylor. To me personally, you know, it means the world. And never in my lifetime have we had a playoff win. I feel like we broke

a curse. But really just looking up at the stands, feeling the city come alive, it's hard to putting the words what it means to everybody in the city. And I'm just really happy to be a part of a team that I was able to do it, and we got a lot more in store. I mean, it's exciting, but this is expected. This isn't like the icing on top of the cake or anything. This is the cake, and so we're moving on. Happy for the city. I think the city can finally exhale. I get that we

haven't failed that pressure. I'll be quite honest me maybe more so than the players because I'm out and about more in the off season and talk to people who've been here a long time, But I don't think the players ever felt that. So I'm just really really happy for the city of Cincinnati and that they get a chance to enjoy this and now just exhale and enjoy

the ride here because we're not done yet. And when it came to handing out game balls, Zach gave one to the man who gave him the opportunity to be an NFL head coach. Two game balls. The first one is to Mike Brown. You know, just because there's nobody who's who's more passionate about this team, of this organization. There's no owner that sits at every walkthrough and every single practice in the freezing cold, the rain, the snow. This means the world to him and I think, you know,

some of the players know him better than others. The coaches, myself, we just owe so much to that man for being patient with us. I personally, if I coached at any other organization in football, I probably wouldn't be here right now in the third year, that's the truth. But he's

he's got the experience and the understanding. And because he's around, and because Paul and Katie and Troy and Caroline Elizabeth, they care so much in their around that they get a chance to hear your vision firsthand on a daily basis. So we're all on the same page. There's no miscommunication. They can see where we need to go and we're going to get there. And I think that they just believe in these players and coaches, and so he was very deserving that. The second one is is to the

city of Cincinnati. You know, we want to start new traditions here with playoff wins where we give game balls to this city and let the fans enjoy it, take selfies with it, whatever it is. We'll figure out how we're going to do that. Disperse these things around sound where people are at their their greatest moments tonight and get a chance to enjoy these balls with us. Because

and I told this to the players. Some of them may not understand the significance of what happened today, but I know a lot of you in the room who are homegrown Cincinnatians certainly do. And like I said earlier, I think this city can finally exhale and just enjoy this team for what it is and take that pressure off those those last thirty one years. And at the same time, there's just such an incredible history here at Cincinnati.

There's Super Bowl appearances, there's there's conference championships, and really, these last even two decades, there's been so many tremendous players, teams and coaches that have come through here that I hope that they feel like they're a part of this win today and they can enjoy this because they've really allowed the foundation for us to do this, And you know, I think that's today was significant for a lot of people. Up next, a road game at one of two places.

If Kansas City beats Pittsburgh on Sunday night, the Bengals head to top seeded Tennessee. If the Steelers somehow managed to upset the Chiefs, the Bengals head to Buffalo. The Bengals Booth podcast is presented by Ultimate Bengals, the free to play fantasy football game. Throughout 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. Now time for postgame analysis with my broadcast partner Dave Lapham Lapp. The drought is over. We've got at least another playoff game to call next week. Can't wait for that wherever it turns out to be. What was your biggest takeaway today? What do you think ultimately allowed the Bengals to win this game. I just think the the intestinal fortitude. I thought both teams fought their tails off, you know. I mean, I get a lot of respect for the Raiders. They just won't quit.

They're like a virus. They won't go away. Man. It's unbelievable, and the Bengals had their hands full with them. But I think I think the plan at Paul Brown Stadium was huge. It's a big advantage. The crowd really helped the Bengals win that football game. There was no two a's about it. Yeah, And I just I really respect what the defense did. They were on fumes, they were gassed.

And to hold the Raiders, who are very explosive offensive football team, to thirty five points in two football games, sixteen points during the regular season, nineteen in the playoffs, to hold them in two games to under twenty points, I think it's a hell of an accomplishment. I really do. I think defensively they should take a big bow. Agreed. Joe Burrows vibe after the game was amazing to me. He's got the sunglasses on, and I mean, you would

have thought that this was a week to win. I mean, he's just like, yeah, it's exciting, but we've got bigger fish to fry. It's incredible. His expectations are like, this is what I thought would happen. I'm not the least bit surprised. You know. I'm glad everybody's happy, and I'm glad everybody's thrilled about it. But this is what I'm This is what I've signed up to do, this is what I'm here for. He is amazing, He really is. You talk about a guy that never gets too high

and never gets too low. That's what every coach and player strives for, is that consistency of personality where you know you know exactly your teammates, your coaches know exactly what theyre can expect out of you. It's not like here one week, down here the other week, both emotionally, mentally, physically with your performance. He is just straight flat flatline at a very high level. He's not flatline at mediocrity.

He is flat line at an extremely high level. And for him to reach that and stay at that level for as often as he does, for as long as he does, is unbelievably remarkable. I mean, it just shows me the laser focused, the attention to detail. He's a great example of hard work pays off. This guy takes no show cuts. He goes the long way in terms of preparation every single week, and it always pays dividends for him. I hate to bang on Andy Dalton because

I respect him and I admire him. But he played in four playoff games and never played well in any of them. One touchdown pass, six interceptions of passer rating in the fifties in his first playoff game, Dalton Burrow rather two touchdown passes, no picks, passer rating of one ten point four. That heartbeat that never rises just shows in those clutch moments for Joe Burrow. It does. And when there are plays that have to be made to win the football game, like the play he made the

Tyler Boy incredible, I mean incredible, extending creating. You know, just before he steps out of my house to throw it the way he threw it where he puts it. To watch he and Jumar Chase, it's like watching Fred asteron Ginger Rogers. It's like watching an unbelievable team. You know that just they know every move the other one's gonna make the subtleties you know, of the whole thing, the nuances. It's just it's just remarkable. And that comes with a lot of hard work too. And the oppressor.

You know, after the after the game, Jamar Chase said, well, we've thrown that at least a thousand times. I mean there's no yeah, there's no substitute for hard work. You know, Repetition breeds comfort level and excellence performance, and those guys are great examples of that. Defensively, it comes down to the final play of the game, fourth and goal from the nine, and Jermaine Pratt steps up and makes that interception, a play that will go down as one of the

most memorable defensive plays in franchise history. And that's why he intercepted it instead of knock it down. I don't want I don't want PBUs. I want interceptions. And I mean he made such a great play, why not I mean, why not just pick that bad boy off, you know, and uh, he's he's he's really come on and developed. I mean, where would they have been without your main prop When Logan Wilson went down. I mean, Jermaine p At stepped up and expanded his role and did it

in a very very convincing way. It wasn't too big for him. And there's no doubt about that. He's a player, and you know, he talks about it every week. His teammates talk about the fact that he talks about it. It's all about the football, and he's always trying to rip it out and fumble drills, and he's always trying to you know, intercept undercut routes and make plays and play their proper angles. And he's trying to get his doctorate in football geometry. I mean, I think he's he's

really smart. He really plays great angles. He understands leverage that that was perfectly leveraged that interception that he made. It really was how'd you feel the on line did? I thought pretty well? I really did. I mean I think there were, you know, a couple of sacks Joe took. He knew he had nowhere to go at the football, and he just you know, kind of like assumed the fetal position almost and covered up and just took the took the sack. Didn't want to take a chance on

putting the ball in jeopardy. And now he's almost one hundred and seventy or over one hundred and seventy attempts now without an interception, And you know, that's something that an offensive line can live vicariously through the fact that you know he's he's a great player, and he is the biggest reason that that's the case. But you've contributed to it. And I thought that these guys are great,

I mean, particularly Crosby. Crosby's unbelieable to watch that guy, Like I talked about earlier, He's Gumby, that's got you know, inspector gadget arms. He can bench four hundred pounds. I mean, that's he's a Everybody talks about these genetic freaks at the skill position. He's a genetic freak at his position. And he's he's very, very difficult to get good contact on and sustain good contact on. He's so slipper, he's so smooth, he's he's he's very very gifted. And you know, Prince,

he had a couple of bad snaps. Everybody's going to against this guy, but I thought overall, I thought he and Jonah Williams hung in there and played pretty darn well. The Bengals have had remarkably good fortune this year. When it comes to injuries, twenty of the twenty two guys on offense and defense started on opening day started this game everybody but the right guard and the right tackle, but as is often the case, they went down. Some

really good players went down in this game. Larry Ogan Jobi first and foremost taken off out of cart Trey Hendrickson checked out for a concussion. Which of these injuries concerned you the most going forward? Larry Ogan Jobi, You know, looks like it's going to be I mean, the way it looked his reaction was the thing that got me. It wasn't just like, oh, I sprained my foot on my ankle. He threw his helmet and disgust. He was very upset to me. He knew that something bad happened,

like an achilles snapping, so that that's extremely unfortunate. So I think he's probably obviously gone. If that's the case, he's not gonna be able to participate anymore. That's a major blow because he is a force inside, you know, pressure in the quarterback's face. He really does a good job of pushing the interior of the pocket. Hopefully Trey Hendrickson will get out of concussion protocol and be able to play in the next football game, and they really

need him on the edge as well. And I admire what the defensive line did. I mean, they were they were down to you know, nobody. They had to take a bunch of snaps, and Sam Hubbard and others talked about how it was tough. You know, they were gas down the stretch and they were just trying to keep

him in the pocket as much as anything. Just don't let him because his car hurt him a little bit with his feet, you know, running and creating and made some big conversions on third down, you know, running the football as well. So yeah, it's um, you know, once you get in the playoffs and it's like anything. Dani's like turnovers coming bunches. Unfortunately injuries coming bunches as well. But in my mind, it gave total verification what Zach

and the organization decided to do in Cleveland. Don't take a chance. I mean, you know, you look at this game. All these guys go down in one game, and a couple of guys went down up in the Cleveland game too, So man, do what they did, and that's the reason they won this football game. A lot of guys came into this game a lot healthier than they would have otherwise. So it's interesting watching CJ Uzama do his postgame news conference.

When it was done and the last question they had been asked, he made a point of expressing his admiration and respect for Zach Taylor, even though he was not asked about it. I think that's big. Um. CJ gets it. He gets it on so many levels. I mean, huge leader, very intelligent, understands you know, team team philosophy, understands people.

I mean, he's he's he's a special dude. And I'm sure Zach Taylor is going to feel, you know, very very proud when he when he hears what CJ did, because, like you said, totally unsolicited and um, it just goes to show though that that this this football team. Like I've said many times, Dick Lebau was my first really great example of it. His players in the secondary not only respected him, they loved him, adored him, worship tim

and it just brought them everybody. I mean, the relationship back and forth between coach and player raised their level of performance. And you know, because they weren't just playing for themselves, they were playing for Dick Lebaux. They were playing for their teammates, they were playing for a bunch of things. And that's kind of what Zack's got going now. He's got a lot of guys in his corner, for sure. I'm happy for Zach. I'm happy for every coach. I'm

happy for the players. I'm happy for Mike Brown and his family. But most of all, I am happy for Bengals fans. I think we were minded today lap of just how great this city will support the Bengals when they play the way they did today and play the way they have this year. Absolutely. I mean, biggest crowd ever Paul Brown Stadium, over sixty six thousand, and they were boisterous, full throat. I mean they were into it

from Jump Street. They were into it, and it caused false starts, penalties, it caused a communication being on the same page. It was massive. I'd say I can think of at least a half a dozen plays where the crowd noise was instrumental as the twelfth man on defense that caused the Raiders offense serious problems. Serious problems in terms of being able to relay information up and down the line of scrimmage, being able to hear an audible, being able to hear a garden to tackle, changing their

blocking call. I mean, all that stuff when you can't when you can't hear, and it all has to be done by signal or by not or wink or whatever. Man, that's that's you start to feel what unfortunately, what deaf people have to deal with every day. It's hard, man, It's hard. And that was a big plus form I think. I think playing at Paul Brown Stadium actually won them that football game. It's gonna be a lot of alcoholic

innsum tonight. There's there's gonna be that's gonna be. Everybody's going to exceed their limit, and curfew is going to be broken. There is no curfew tonight for everybody. Everybody's gonna party hard and you know, and it's well earned. I feel very very happy for this football team. What they've done is well earned and even more well deserved. Or on the win and to look ahead to what's next. Join lapping me from Bengals Line Monday night from six

to nine on seven hundred WLW. Now time for this week's fun facts segment, and my guest is the shortest player on the Bengals roster. Time for some fun facts with wide receiver Trent Taylor from Shreveport, Louisiana in the upper left corner of the state. If you're looking at Louisiana on a map, not far from the Texas and Arkansas borders. Trent, tell us a little bit about where you grew up and some of the things you enjoyed doing when you were young. I grew up in Streeport.

I actually moved there when I was in second grade. I was born in Tennessee, then moved up to move down to Streeport when I was in second grade and got very accointed with the Louisiana culture, fell in love with crawfish and gumbo and all that kind of stuff. And yeah, I went to high school there. Then I went to Louisiana Tech, which is about an hour away. So yeah, I spent most of my life in Louisiana. And you are a football family. From what I can tell,

your dad played college football at Western Kentucky. He's an author and a motivational speaker. Tell me a little bit about him and the impact he had on you becoming a professional athlete. He had the biggest impact on me. He I mean, he taught me everything growing up. He was always he was always my coach and all the different kinds of sports growing up. And if he wasn't my coach, I was I was still learning more from

him than I was my other coaches. So, I mean, he just taught me everything about you know, how to work, how to compete, how to go get what you want. So yeah, I learned a lot from just watching him and and learning from him. So yeah, a lot of the credit goes to him for me being where I in today. We're doing fun facts with Trent Taylor. You were blessed with speed, quickness, great eye, hand coordination, but not height. Were you always one of the smaller kids

growing up? Yeah? I always was. I was always waiting for that moment where I was going to hit my growth spurt. Never really happened though, so still waiting for it though. You know, you never know what it could happen. Never hurts to dream. Did that put a chip on your shoulder? Yeah, definitely, I mean it was. I mean football is always the sport that I love more than anything. You know, I played every sport going up, but football

was always what I wanted to do. And you know, in high school, I quit playing baseball, and I got a lot of flak for that from baseball coaches, like, you know, you're you're not the type of guy that plays football, you need to be playing baseball type of thing. I heard that from a lot of people. But I just continue to do what I loved and what I wanted to do, and uh, you know, I I kept believing in myself and just kept putting in the work, and luckily I've made it to where I wanted to be.

And I mean, I obviously want to do better than where I'm at right now in the NFL, but you know, I came a long ways though, for sure. How did you wind up at Louisiana Tech? Yeah, Louisiana Tech was my one offer coming out of high school. You know, I didn't get too much attention just being five ft eight, you know, five foot eight white guy, they don't get too much attention. But you know, I put up a bunch of good stats in high school. Luckily, we threw the ball around a lot, so I had a million

catches in high school, which helped a lot. So got me one offer, and that one offer was all I needed. A million catches in high school and in college. As a senior at Louisiana Tack, you led the nation in receiving yards with one thousand, eight hundred and three. Some of the other top receivers in college football that year included Juju Smith, Schuster, Corey Davis, John Ross. How big of a deal was it for you to lead all of college football in receiving yards. It was a big deal.

I mean, it was a big accompliment. Always something that I wanted to do. Definitely, one of my goals that year was to do that. And you know, luckily, we had a great offense at Louisiana Tech that gave me plenty of opportunities and you know, made the most of it. So I mean, yeah, that's what has given me a good opportunity to try to have a long career in the NFL. And so I'm still out here trying to

do that. We're doing fun facts with Trent Taylor. You were drafted by the forty nine ers in the fifth round back in twenty seventeen. Describe your draft experience. Oh yeah, it was great. I remember. I mean I was sitting there with my family all day long waiting. You know, my mom wanted to throw a draft party, and I was kind of hesitant on that, like, I don't want everyone to be here broken hearted if I don't get drafted,

But sure we can throw a draft party. But then luckily got a call from San Francisco in the fifth round and talked to John Lange and Kyle Shanahan, and I mean, they're great. I love being there with them for four years. Yeah, so my time in San Francisco, I enjoyed it out there, but happy to be here in Cincinnating with the Bengals. You had a really good rookie year with forty three catches, including twenty seven on

third down that led all NFL rookies that year. You had a solid second season despite back surgery before that year, and then year three unfortunately with something of a nightmare because of a foot injury and an infection in your foot.

Describe that ordeal. That whole road in my NFL career has been tough just to watch, to watch me have some success my rookie season and to think I was gonna just I thought that was you know, that was the bottom, you know, the platform that I was going to build off of um and then back surgery happened, and then, um, the foot surgery was something that was supposed to just keep me out for like two or three games, and then uh, you know, the screw and my foot was a little messed up. We had to

go and redo it. And once we redid it, um the infection happened at that point, and then, um so I ended up missing the entire season that year, um just going foot a foot surgery after foot surgery and uh five five surgeries later, Um it was finally over with. But then the season was over at that point. So um, yeah, it was a lot. It was a lot to deal with and a lot that I had to try to build my body back from. Um So, so, I feel

good with where I'm at right now. I feel like I'm continuing to um get faster and get back to where I used to be. Um So now I'm just kind of waiting on that opportunity to go out there and improve it. Forty nine Ers made the Super Bowl that year. I'm sure you were thrilled for your teammates and coaches, but it did did that make your personal situation even tougher? Yeah? Way tougher. Honestly, it was. It

was emotional day at the Super Bowl. Um, just to like be in that atmosphere, to see how big of a stage it was. And the fact that I couldn't play it was because some doctors messed up my foot. Um, it just didn't sit right with me at all. So

it was, I mean, it was. It was a time I'll always remember, a day that I'll always remember, just the way that I felt being out there watching it from the sidelines, and you know, watching our team lose in the fourth quarter, the way that we did something that will always motivate me and always I'll always remember. Here's hoping you get to participate healthy the next time around. You joined the Bengals this year as a free agent.

You were promoted to the active roster for the Denver game, and afterward you treat it about tweeted about how great it felt to be back out there. What is it about football that you love so much? Man? It was like it was a feeling that I kind of forgot about because it feels like I haven't really been on the field and so long. But um, I mean that's that type of feeling that you get being out there on the football field is something that I don't think

you can find anywhere else on this earth. It's that adrenaline rush that's just unmatched, and it's it's the reason why when people leave the game, it's so hard for him because to match that adrenaline rush somewhere somewhere else is extremely hard to do. And just being in front of so many people, and because like I was doing the opening kickoff for the Denver game and that's when it's like the loudest and man, that's just such a cool experience to be out there in the middle of

the field when the crowd's born. I mean, those moments are the reason why you do it. So it was just it was an awesome time. A few wildcard categories to wrap things up. Who is your all time favorite athlete in any sport and why? I was thinking football, and I instantly thought of Barry Sanders, just like watching him run and move and juwe people out. That was

always so much fun to watch. But then I also think of guys like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, just the way that their mentality was going into the game, the way that they prepared every single day. That kind of stuff was just unmatched. And you know something that I strive for some some some guys that I strive to be like because they loved the game unlike anyone else, and they were willing to do whatever it took to continue to play at a high level for as long

as they could. And you know, that's the kind of mentality that I tried to take in my game as well. What do you like to splur John? I like vacations. I remember I always said, like they asked me in an interview in the NFL draft, what's the first big thing that I'm going to spend my money on. I always had a boat. Um, I always like going on like going on the lake, hanging with my hanging with my friends on the lake. But I haven't bought a boat yet. Um, maybe we'll get there one day. But yeah,

I would say vacations. I like taking nice vacations. All right, last thing and I'll let you go. This is kind of deep. If you could meet anybody in history, athlete, actor, statesman, politician, religious figure, whoever it might be, who would that person be? I mean, Jesus comes to mind. Does Jesus count? Absolutely? That's easy one right there. Yeah, I mean I got plenty of plenty of questions for him. I got a whole list of them, so beginning with why couldn't I

have been six? Five? Yeah, that's that's a good one. That's that's that's number one on the list. Yeah, Trent, you're off the hot seat. I appreciate your time. Best of luck the rest of the year. I appreciate you. 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 downloaded now

from the App Store and Google Play. And 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 thank you for listening to The Bengals Booth Podcast.