Zac Taylor isn’t exactly pulling punches when talking about his team publicly.
The Cincinnati Bengals head coach said one of his linebackers needed to step up and be a leader. A day later, the Bengals cut Preston Brown.
Asked about the overall trajectory of this 0-9 campaign coming off a 49-13 loss, Taylor was blunt. The comments are eyebrow-raising.
Here’s what he told the media:
“This league is hard. It’s very unforgiving sometimes, and we’re facing that right now. What we do know is that this is the toughest stretch we’re going to go through in our next 20 years here. This is going to be the toughest one. We find out a lot about the character of the people in this building and what the approach is going to be so we can look back on this and say that it made us stronger, because we faced the hardest it was ever going to be — the most adversity we ever face. These people stuck through it and did it the right way, and we’ll build on that. There’ll be a time — I can’t wait to look back on it — and say, ‘Remember when all that stuff happened?’ You guys will laugh with me, I promise (laughter). We’ll get there.”
Bengals fans have been through a lot, which is putting it nicely. The 1990s were a brutal stretch too, and this sure reeks of familiarity. This is as nice as Taylor can be while sticking to his guns about the long-term build here, with this terrible stretch serving as the foundation for a culture overhaul.
By all accounts, Taylor has been the voice of the organization as a whole just as coaches before him were. The front office won’t say anything. Judging by this, it sure sounds like Taylor isn’t in any job danger regardless of season results.
And if Taylor comes out of the other side of this and indeed can look back and smile, Bengals fans won’t complain too much. But in the heat of the moment, it’s understandable if fans shrug the talk off.
