September 12, 2025 • 10 mins
Robert Weintraub writes a weekly Bengals column for Cincinnati Magazine. He joined us this week to put a bow on the Bengals' win over Cleveland.
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Listen to the show live weekday afternoons 3:00 - 6:00 on ESPN1530.
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Follow on X: @MoEgger
Instagram too: @MoEgger
Podcasts of The Mo Egger Radio Show are a service of Longnecks Sports Grill.
Listen to the show live weekday afternoons 3:00 - 6:00 on ESPN1530.
Listen Live: ESPN1530.com/listen
Get more: https://linktr.ee/MoEgger
Follow on X: @MoEgger
Instagram too: @MoEgger
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
By the way, we're broadcasting from the Kroger Queen City
Championship presented by A P ANDNG, and there's like the
bar for the members is maybe twenty feet away. Am
I allowed to go over there to get a nice
cold bud light? We've already determined I could smoke a
cigar while I'm doing this show, and trust me, we're
(00:20):
about to light our second. But looking into that bud
light situation, busy hour still ahead. Our friend Cam Miller
is going to join us. He has what looks like
an awesome film on the Big Red Machine that's going
to premiere next week, and he is going to join
us at five forty five. And our friend Reagan Holgate
from Fox nineteen knows more about golf than anybody, and
since we're at a golf tournament, we're having her on
(00:41):
the show. But Thursdays in the five o'clock hour mean
we spend time with our buddy Robert Wintroup Cincinnati Magazine.
He writes a weekly Bengals column and he's here to
celebrate a Bengals victory over the Cleveland Browns.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Hi, Robert, you know I'm not smoking and drinking on
the job, but I am celebrating the winning in the
open air. It feels so good.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
The imagine when you spend eighteen years talking about the
Cincinnati Bengals every single day, you are driven to smoke
and drinking.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Still question about it. But clean living is going to
be the key to this year's rod. Remember, I think, yeah,
bettering the last couple of years, that's it.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
So yeah, you know, don't get if you that's right, yes,
if you if you leave, if you live clean, you
get lucky. Right, That's what my grandma used to say.
Bengals may have got lucky, but I think to a
degree they created their own luck against the Browns.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Yeah, no question. I mean, you know, some of it
was just typical Browns being Browns. And as a Syracuse man,
I feel bad for my man Andre Schmidt. But you
should have You should have called Van and White a
long time ago and bought a bow. Let's fake it.
So yeah, but we talked a lot about this before, right,
how many games last year did they have bad luck
and bad juju at the end of these games? And
(02:03):
he left going, oh, the Bengals were the better team,
but they lost the game. Now you know, shoes on
the other foot a little bit. And if they're gonna
really have the season we expect and want them to have,
some of these games are just gonna have to break
that way. And you know, as you said, they made
their own luck. The Browns. Maybe they're often quote unquote
the Browns the factory of said, and this seemed that
(02:24):
we'd like to mock. But obviously they've played really well
against Cincinnati. You know, the previous ten games of the
Burrow era since twenty twenty, they've averaged one hundred and
forty eight yards on the ground against Cincinnati. That was
reversed in a big way by the Bengals. And I
think they really pointed a lot to that in the
off season. And you know, they made a point this
entire season of looking at their schedules saying, all right,
(02:46):
a full third of it, the Browns, Steelers and Ravens
want to treat us like bowling pins and just smash
right through us, and we're not gonna let that happen.
And so after one game, you know, mission accomplished, and
the fact that the win was maybe a little tighter
than we all wanted, whatever, I mean, given the fact
that as we all know, the narrative had been they
couldn't win for losing in those first games of the
(03:08):
season no matter what they did. The fact they walked
away with a win and achieved the idea that they
stopped another team's running attack, I think was a good
sign going forward.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
You know, there were lots of areas to focus on defensively.
For me, this is what stood out just in real time.
And I've talked about this a little bit this week.
Al Golden has talked about, Look, my defense is going
to emphasize linebackers. Logan Wilson's going to be a big
reason why. Demetrius Knight's going to be a big reason why.
It had been maybe over a year since since. When
(03:36):
I was watching the game, I said to myself, Hey,
there's Logan Wilson. And I said that often, and I
also said it about his counterpart, Dimitrius Knight.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
Yeah, no question. And remember we talked after the draft
and we sort of wondered, why would they pick Demetrius Knight,
a linebacker, over say, a safety as Xavier Watts, who
went to Notre Dame and played for Al Golden and
seemed to make sense for what the Bengals needed, right,
But he was obvious thinking. You know, when your linebackers
play fast, your whole defense plays fast. That's sort of
an NFL maximum. And you saw it really play out.
(04:07):
And I think last year, you know, we talked about
a lot the absence of DJ Reader in the middle
and the fact maybe they let him go a year
too early rather than a year too late, and they
felt his absence last year. And I think with the
addition this time of TJ. Slaton and have about Mike
Pennell coming out of nowhere and adding support in the middle,
and you know, he really allowed the linebackers to play
clean and not let the Browns linemen get to that
(04:29):
second level. And that's why you noticed Knight and Wilson,
as you said, even Barrett Carter a little bit when
he got in there, you know, being able to run
sideline the sideline, arrive with the violence and play and
do what they do best, which is diagnose and react
and not have to, you know, work through the muck
to get to a play, to get to a ball carrier.
(04:49):
And that really helped it out. And you know, your
eyes did not deceive you. They played well, and like
you said, it's been a long time since we can
say that about the linebacking core in general.
Speaker 4 (04:58):
Just make tackle.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
And I was surprised they were credited, so to speak,
with seven missed ones because I thought the tackling and
that's something that just drove me nuts last year. I
thought the tackling was significantly better. Answer this for me,
Robert Wintrop, Cincinnati Magazine. I tweeted out a link by
the way to his column this week. The first drive
at the game, they run the ball effectively Chase Brown
He gets seven carries, which you know, if you think
(05:22):
back to last year as opener, he played seventeen snaps
and got six touches the entire game and then especially
in the second half, they weren't able to do anything effectively.
But I think it was striking that in the absence
of throwing the ball they suddenly couldn't run it. Why
were they unable to run the ball as effectively as
they did that first drive?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Yeah, well, you know, it works both ways. Give credit
to the Browns in this case for playing the scheme
that took the Bengals running game away from them and
made them pass, which you don't usually want to do.
When you're talking about the Bengals. But you know they
knew going in and especially as the game, as you say,
played out in the first quarter with the Bengals being
so run heavy, that Cincinnati was obviously going to be conservative,
(06:02):
stay away from being in obvious passing situations and letting
Miles Garrett loose. This formula that has really killed the
Bengals when they played the Browns, especially in Cleveland in
the past. And you know, they were able to man
up on the outside, which few teams can do, and
really stacked the box heavily. And once they saw that
the Bengals were going to play very conservatively in this
(06:23):
game and run the ball, you know, first, last, and
and thirds, which they don't usually do against other teams,
they really went out of their way to you know,
stack the box against them and take that run away
and force them into passing situations. And we're effective at it.
I mean not many you know, every team wants to
be able to do that, but it's not always so
easy to do. And the Browns did it, you know that.
(06:45):
I think while Dalton Riisener played well in his first game,
especially coming you know in the week before the game
and having one practice, you know, it was still easily enough,
you know, where he didn't have all the plays down Patty,
you know, all the combinations in terms of blocking that
he had to do. I think the Bengals went to
a little bit of a you know, sort of safe
(07:07):
playbook for lack of a better phrase, in the running
game and didn't really break out some of the things
they may run later in the season, and you know,
just kind of worked against them, and they couldn't build
any momentum. As the second half went long, they were
constantly behind the sticks and three and out and just
didn't get a chance to establish the run in that
way that they had in the first half. And that's
the way it goes sometimes. Remember, you know, they played
(07:28):
in the preseason. Everybody made a big deal about that,
but even when they played in the preseason, it's not
anywhere close to sixteen minutes, and the game gets long
for a while, and you know, sometimes the things you
can do early you can't wait. That's what's on Sunday.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
They offensively, look, we knew going in the Browns it's
not a great matchup. Good corners, Miles Garrett. They have
the kryptonite for a lot of offenses. Was there something there.
You might not have Miles Garrett, you might not have
their corners, but it was there was something there that
another defensive coordinator can grab as kind of a blueprint
(08:05):
for at least slowing down Cincinnati's offense.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Well to a point. I mean, I think you can
also put in Carson Swashingter, who played his first game
for Cleveland as a rookie linebacker and looked really good.
We talked about Night playing so well in his first game.
Cleveland sort of had the same thing going with with
Sweshingter and his sideline to sudelind ability was certainly a
pleasant surprise for them. And you know, when you have
that sort of three level difference makers, as the Browns
(08:31):
do with their corners and Garrett, and then throw a
linebacker in, whether it was you know, Jeremiah asoaka Moosa
in the past, or however you say it's the name
Joker and now Sweshingter to replace him, that always gives
the Bengals trouble. I don't know how many teams on
the schedule can match that sort of you know, detailed
and depth in terms of all three levels of defenses,
(08:53):
and certainly a lot of teams are not gonna want
the Bengals to get into passing situations the way the
Browns kind of do. That doesn't mean that they won't
be able to force Cincinnati, and especially with teams like
Minnesota and Denver coming up who have excellent pass rushes
and deceptive ones. You know, they don't rely on the
one great pass rusher like the Cleveland does, but they
(09:14):
you know, do a lot of things schematically to get
their guys free runs at the quarterbacks. So it's a
different style that will you know, maybe stymy the Bengals
uncertain drives, but overall, I don't think too many teams
are able to do what the Browns do, and I
think you so when Pittsburgh acquired Jalen Ramsey, they kind
of want to follow that blueprint and just get corners
(09:34):
you can man up with, or at least try to
man up with Cincinnatis receivers and force them to go
to other guys and go over the middle a little
bit more where they can, you know, sort of rally
to the ball a little better than you can against
the Bengals outside receivers. We'll see if it plays out
as well for the Steelers as it did with the
Browns in this first game. But most teams really can't
match that kind of you three level base defense that
(09:56):
the Browns can throw at them and make them do
what they want to do rather and react to what
the Bengals.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Wanting to do.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Yeah, well put Robert Weintraub, Cincinnati Magazine dot Com read
his weekly Bengals column.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Awesome as always. Man, we'll talk next.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Week, can't wait. I hope we go to and O
for ones.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Let's hope, so that would be a delight.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
And if they do, then you're not gonna want to
be around me with the cigars and the drink.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
And I'm just telling you, okay, live your best life moment.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
That's all.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Like you said, I try, Robert wintroud There you go,
Cincinntimagazine dot com.
Speaker 4 (10:28):
Don't forget the game on Sunday at one o'clock.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Pregame coverage from The Holy Grail on ESPN fifteen thirty
begins at nine o'clock on Sunday
By the way, we're broadcasting from the Kroger Queen City
Championship presented by A P ANDNG, and there's like the
bar for the members is maybe twenty feet away. Am
I allowed to go over there to get a nice
cold bud light? We've already determined I could smoke a
cigar while I'm doing this show, and trust me, we're
(00:20):
about to light our second. But looking into that bud
light situation, busy hour still ahead. Our friend Cam Miller
is going to join us. He has what looks like
an awesome film on the Big Red Machine that's going
to premiere next week, and he is going to join
us at five forty five. And our friend Reagan Holgate
from Fox nineteen knows more about golf than anybody, and
since we're at a golf tournament, we're having her on
(00:41):
the show. But Thursdays in the five o'clock hour mean
we spend time with our buddy Robert Wintroup Cincinnati Magazine.
He writes a weekly Bengals column and he's here to
celebrate a Bengals victory over the Cleveland Browns.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Hi, Robert, you know I'm not smoking and drinking on
the job, but I am celebrating the winning in the
open air. It feels so good.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
The imagine when you spend eighteen years talking about the
Cincinnati Bengals every single day, you are driven to smoke
and drinking.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Still question about it. But clean living is going to
be the key to this year's rod. Remember, I think, yeah,
bettering the last couple of years, that's it.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
So yeah, you know, don't get if you that's right, yes,
if you if you leave, if you live clean, you
get lucky. Right, That's what my grandma used to say.
Bengals may have got lucky, but I think to a
degree they created their own luck against the Browns.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Yeah, no question. I mean, you know, some of it
was just typical Browns being Browns. And as a Syracuse man,
I feel bad for my man Andre Schmidt. But you
should have You should have called Van and White a
long time ago and bought a bow. Let's fake it.
So yeah, but we talked a lot about this before, right,
how many games last year did they have bad luck
and bad juju at the end of these games? And
(02:03):
he left going, oh, the Bengals were the better team,
but they lost the game. Now you know, shoes on
the other foot a little bit. And if they're gonna
really have the season we expect and want them to have,
some of these games are just gonna have to break
that way. And you know, as you said, they made
their own luck. The Browns. Maybe they're often quote unquote
the Browns the factory of said, and this seemed that
(02:24):
we'd like to mock. But obviously they've played really well
against Cincinnati. You know, the previous ten games of the
Burrow era since twenty twenty, they've averaged one hundred and
forty eight yards on the ground against Cincinnati. That was
reversed in a big way by the Bengals. And I
think they really pointed a lot to that in the
off season. And you know, they made a point this
entire season of looking at their schedules saying, all right,
(02:46):
a full third of it, the Browns, Steelers and Ravens
want to treat us like bowling pins and just smash
right through us, and we're not gonna let that happen.
And so after one game, you know, mission accomplished, and
the fact that the win was maybe a little tighter
than we all wanted, whatever, I mean, given the fact
that as we all know, the narrative had been they
couldn't win for losing in those first games of the
(03:08):
season no matter what they did. The fact they walked
away with a win and achieved the idea that they
stopped another team's running attack, I think was a good
sign going forward.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
You know, there were lots of areas to focus on defensively.
For me, this is what stood out just in real time.
And I've talked about this a little bit this week.
Al Golden has talked about, Look, my defense is going
to emphasize linebackers. Logan Wilson's going to be a big
reason why. Demetrius Knight's going to be a big reason why.
It had been maybe over a year since since. When
(03:36):
I was watching the game, I said to myself, Hey,
there's Logan Wilson. And I said that often, and I
also said it about his counterpart, Dimitrius Knight.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
Yeah, no question. And remember we talked after the draft
and we sort of wondered, why would they pick Demetrius Knight,
a linebacker, over say, a safety as Xavier Watts, who
went to Notre Dame and played for Al Golden and
seemed to make sense for what the Bengals needed, right,
But he was obvious thinking. You know, when your linebackers
play fast, your whole defense plays fast. That's sort of
an NFL maximum. And you saw it really play out.
(04:07):
And I think last year, you know, we talked about
a lot the absence of DJ Reader in the middle
and the fact maybe they let him go a year
too early rather than a year too late, and they
felt his absence last year. And I think with the
addition this time of TJ. Slaton and have about Mike
Pennell coming out of nowhere and adding support in the middle,
and you know, he really allowed the linebackers to play
clean and not let the Browns linemen get to that
(04:29):
second level. And that's why you noticed Knight and Wilson,
as you said, even Barrett Carter a little bit when
he got in there, you know, being able to run
sideline the sideline, arrive with the violence and play and
do what they do best, which is diagnose and react
and not have to, you know, work through the muck
to get to a play, to get to a ball carrier.
(04:49):
And that really helped it out. And you know, your
eyes did not deceive you. They played well, and like
you said, it's been a long time since we can
say that about the linebacking core in general.
Speaker 4 (04:58):
Just make tackle.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
And I was surprised they were credited, so to speak,
with seven missed ones because I thought the tackling and
that's something that just drove me nuts last year. I
thought the tackling was significantly better. Answer this for me,
Robert Wintrop, Cincinnati Magazine. I tweeted out a link by
the way to his column this week. The first drive
at the game, they run the ball effectively Chase Brown
He gets seven carries, which you know, if you think
(05:22):
back to last year as opener, he played seventeen snaps
and got six touches the entire game and then especially
in the second half, they weren't able to do anything effectively.
But I think it was striking that in the absence
of throwing the ball they suddenly couldn't run it. Why
were they unable to run the ball as effectively as
they did that first drive?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Yeah, well, you know, it works both ways. Give credit
to the Browns in this case for playing the scheme
that took the Bengals running game away from them and
made them pass, which you don't usually want to do.
When you're talking about the Bengals. But you know they
knew going in and especially as the game, as you say,
played out in the first quarter with the Bengals being
so run heavy, that Cincinnati was obviously going to be conservative,
(06:02):
stay away from being in obvious passing situations and letting
Miles Garrett loose. This formula that has really killed the
Bengals when they played the Browns, especially in Cleveland in
the past. And you know, they were able to man
up on the outside, which few teams can do, and
really stacked the box heavily. And once they saw that
the Bengals were going to play very conservatively in this
(06:23):
game and run the ball, you know, first, last, and
and thirds, which they don't usually do against other teams,
they really went out of their way to you know,
stack the box against them and take that run away
and force them into passing situations. And we're effective at it.
I mean not many you know, every team wants to
be able to do that, but it's not always so
easy to do. And the Browns did it, you know that.
(06:45):
I think while Dalton Riisener played well in his first game,
especially coming you know in the week before the game
and having one practice, you know, it was still easily enough,
you know, where he didn't have all the plays down Patty,
you know, all the combinations in terms of blocking that
he had to do. I think the Bengals went to
a little bit of a you know, sort of safe
(07:07):
playbook for lack of a better phrase, in the running
game and didn't really break out some of the things
they may run later in the season, and you know,
just kind of worked against them, and they couldn't build
any momentum. As the second half went long, they were
constantly behind the sticks and three and out and just
didn't get a chance to establish the run in that
way that they had in the first half. And that's
the way it goes sometimes. Remember, you know, they played
(07:28):
in the preseason. Everybody made a big deal about that,
but even when they played in the preseason, it's not
anywhere close to sixteen minutes, and the game gets long
for a while, and you know, sometimes the things you
can do early you can't wait. That's what's on Sunday.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
They offensively, look, we knew going in the Browns it's
not a great matchup. Good corners, Miles Garrett. They have
the kryptonite for a lot of offenses. Was there something there.
You might not have Miles Garrett, you might not have
their corners, but it was there was something there that
another defensive coordinator can grab as kind of a blueprint
(08:05):
for at least slowing down Cincinnati's offense.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
Well to a point. I mean, I think you can
also put in Carson Swashingter, who played his first game
for Cleveland as a rookie linebacker and looked really good.
We talked about Night playing so well in his first game.
Cleveland sort of had the same thing going with with
Sweshingter and his sideline to sudelind ability was certainly a
pleasant surprise for them. And you know, when you have
that sort of three level difference makers, as the Browns
(08:31):
do with their corners and Garrett, and then throw a
linebacker in, whether it was you know, Jeremiah asoaka Moosa
in the past, or however you say it's the name
Joker and now Sweshingter to replace him, that always gives
the Bengals trouble. I don't know how many teams on
the schedule can match that sort of you know, detailed
and depth in terms of all three levels of defenses,
(08:53):
and certainly a lot of teams are not gonna want
the Bengals to get into passing situations the way the
Browns kind of do. That doesn't mean that they won't
be able to force Cincinnati, and especially with teams like
Minnesota and Denver coming up who have excellent pass rushes
and deceptive ones. You know, they don't rely on the
one great pass rusher like the Cleveland does, but they
(09:14):
you know, do a lot of things schematically to get
their guys free runs at the quarterbacks. So it's a
different style that will you know, maybe stymy the Bengals
uncertain drives, but overall, I don't think too many teams
are able to do what the Browns do, and I
think you so when Pittsburgh acquired Jalen Ramsey, they kind
of want to follow that blueprint and just get corners
(09:34):
you can man up with, or at least try to
man up with Cincinnatis receivers and force them to go
to other guys and go over the middle a little
bit more where they can, you know, sort of rally
to the ball a little better than you can against
the Bengals outside receivers. We'll see if it plays out
as well for the Steelers as it did with the
Browns in this first game. But most teams really can't
match that kind of you three level base defense that
(09:56):
the Browns can throw at them and make them do
what they want to do rather and react to what
the Bengals.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Wanting to do.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Yeah, well put Robert Weintraub, Cincinnati Magazine dot Com read
his weekly Bengals column.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
Awesome as always. Man, we'll talk next.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Week, can't wait. I hope we go to and O
for ones.
Speaker 4 (10:12):
Let's hope, so that would be a delight.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
And if they do, then you're not gonna want to
be around me with the cigars and the drink.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
And I'm just telling you, okay, live your best life moment.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
That's all.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Like you said, I try, Robert wintroud There you go,
Cincinntimagazine dot com.
Speaker 4 (10:28):
Don't forget the game on Sunday at one o'clock.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Pregame coverage from The Holy Grail on ESPN fifteen thirty
begins at nine o'clock on Sunday
Mo Egger News
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