The Cincinnati Bengals, especially this year it seems, love finding every little motivational angle they can from upcoming opponents.
Buy Bengals TicketsAnd Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady might have just given the defense a major nugget to chew on before the Week 15 showdown.
On his “Let’s Go!” podcast, Brady said the following while talking about the Cincinnati defense, according to Jay Morrison of The Athletic:
“Great team, great young quarterback, fairly tough defense. Good skill players. They do a lot of things well. We’re gonna have to put everything we got into it. Like everything we got. Mentally, physically, emotionally. There’s a lot of things this time of year that can pull your focus away from where it needs to be. But we gotta put everything into it if we’re gonna beat a good team.”
Doesn’t seem too bad given the coach-speak, vague approach to the answer — but fairly tough defense will stick out to onlookers and players.
The Cincinnati defense only allows 20.4 points per game, recently shuttering Patrick Mahomes and keeping elite runners like Derrick Henry and Nick Chubb in check, holding both to less than 40 rushing yards and a 3.0 average.
Brady’s Buccaneers have struggled mightily this year at 6-7, with the offense averaging just 17.2 points per game (28th).
While the comments aren’t that ridiculous, pros tend to take any little thing they can as motivation, not unlike them going after the Chiefs for comments recently. This could end up similar and the defense is in a good position to make its presence felt.
