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The original was posted on /r/hobbydrama by /u/JarJarBrinksSecurity on 2024-09-09 16:16:34+00:00.
Football is back! And so is my depression that my teams all suck. A couple months ago, I wrote a post about the heated rivalry between the Cincinnati Reds and the Pittsburgh Pirates. At the end, I mentioned that the same cities football teams had a similar explosion. I think it’s underselling it to call it an explosion. So sit back and enjoy the story of what lead up to and what happened in the 2015 AFC Wild Card Game.
TW: I do just want to add a tiny trigger warning. There will be videos of injuries if you’re squeamish.
Here We Are Juggernaut
For those not familiar with the NFL, the Pittsburgh Steelers are one of the premier teams in the league. Not currently at this moment, but historically. The Steelers have 6 Super Bowl championships and are tied with the New England Patriots in wins. The Bengals on the other hand…have none. In fact, the Cincinnati Bengals went 30 years without even achieving a playoff win until they made the entire city of Cincinnati erupt in tears when they finally won in 2021. Just like their baseball counterparts, these 2 teams have a long and sordid rivalry with many, many years of contempt.
Back in 1970, the two football leagues, the NFL and the AFL, decided to merge into one big league. When they made the division, they decided to place the Steelers and the Bengals in the same division. The Bengals were an average team while the Steelers were pretty respectable. The first couple of years were evenly matched with the Steelers winning 5 of the 8 meetings.
But in the mid-70s, the Steelers started their dominance against the entire league. Their defense was given the nickname the “Steel Curtain” because of their shut-down defense. The Bengals were only able to score more than 17 points in 2 meetings over the next 6 seasons and lost 6 straight against the Steelers. Although, the 0-6 Bengals managed to blowout the Steelers 34-10 in 1979. But the Steelers would go on to win the Super Bowl that year.
The tides turned a bit though starting in 1980. The Bengals revamped their team and became legitimate contenders. They snapped the Steelers 18-game home winning streak and beat them in both games that year. This was the first season since 1971 that The Steelers missed the playoffs.
I’ll skip the next 20 years as it’s this over and over again. The Steelers are a better team and even though the Bengals turned into a dumpster fire in the 90s, they still managed to beat the Steelers sometimes. It wasn’t exactly a firecracker of a rivalry yet, but it wasn’t civil either.
Everything Evil
After an abysmal 2-14 season, the Bengals hired Marvin Lewis, who had a Super Bowl win as the Baltimore Ravens defensive coordinator. Although they weren’t a good team, they posted an 8-8 record and had a bright spot in their newly drafted quarterback Carson Palmer. Along with a generational talent in Chad Johnson at wide receiver, the Bengals looked poised to stand atop their division. But the Steelers just one year later drafted a quarterback that is most likely going to be elected to the Hall of Fame, Ben Roethlisberger. This is really where the rivalry started taking off.
The 2005 season saw both teams were fighting for 1st place in their division. When the 2 teams met on December 4th, Bengals WR T.J. Houshmandzadeh took a Terrible Towel (a yellow towel that is spun in the air by fans) and used it to wipe his cleats, which prompted boos to rain down from the Pittsburgh crowd.
And as fate would have it, the teams met up in the 2005 Wild Card game. This is not THE wild card game, but it is almost as brutal. For the first time in 15 years, the Bengals were in the playoffs. And hopes were high. This Bengals team looked different. Every player on this team was part of a well-oiled machine all lead by the Touchdown and Completion Percentage leader, Carson Palmer. But heartbreak would ensue for the city just 5 minutes into the game.
On the Bengals 2nd offensive play of the game, Palmer launched a ball for a 66 yard pass. But as the camera panned back, Palmer was on the ground in pain. What happened was Steelers player Kimo von Oelhoffen went very low on Palmer and rolled onto his leg, causing a season-ending knee injury. Even with Palmer out, the Bengals didn’t lay down and die. Their backup quarterback, Jon Kitna, was no slouch. But it wasn’t enough as the Bengals lost to the Steelers, who would end up winning the Super Bowl that year.
Von Oelhoffen publicly apologized for the hit, but Palmer said that he never received a direct apology but also wasn’t mad as he felt it was part of the game. That didn’t stop fans though. The name Kimo von Oelhoffen is hated throughout Cincinnati sports and brings up unpleasant memories. And although the hit wasn’t against the rules at the time, the NFL would later create a rule that required defenders to take every opportunity to avoid hitting the quarterback at or below the knees when they are in a defenseless position. This dynamic where the Steelers would do something against the Bengals which would then later be made a rule was a driving force in the rivalry between the teams.
Blood Red Summer
After Palmer’s return, the Bengals didn’t falter in the regular season, but would never find success in the post season. But to make tensions even higher between the teams, there were some moments that stick in the heads of Cincinnati fans.
And some things that didn’t create rules but were also catalysts.
There are 2 more rules, but those are important to the story so I’ll save them. And I’m not saying the Bengals are exempt from this behavior (they didn’t have a great reputation for a while under Marvin Lewis), it was pretty one-sided. Bengals fans and players themselves were getting more and more heated as the years went on.
Crossing the Frame
After some tensions in the Bengals organization, big players left the team. Carson Palmer and Chad Johnson were out, Chris Henry who was looking like a future HOF at one point tragically passed in the late 2000s after an accident, and the teams finished dead last in 2010. But in the 2011 draft, the Bengals picked up WR AJ Green and QB Andy Dalton. AJ Green immediately showed greatness and while Dalton wasn’t MVP material, he was enough to get the team to the playoffs. But for 4 straight years, they lost in the Wild Card game, frankly becoming a joke in the league. And although the Steelers hadn’t won a Super Bowl since 2008, they were still firmly a playoff team.
But 2015 was a new year for the Bengals, and it quickly showed. Jumping out to an impressive 7-0 start, which included beating the Steelers in Pittsburgh, the Bengals were top of the league. And although they obviously lost games, they finished a very impressive 12-4. But the real shocker was that Andy Dalton was looking like an MVP caliber quarterback. Even as a Dalton truther myself, this season from Dalton was above his usual performance. But as a Cincinnati fan, you always know never to get content with winning or success, because something always happens to make it come crashing down.
In the week 14 matchup against the Steelers, Dalton threw an interception and in the process of trying to tackle the runner, broke his thumb. Although the team around him was good, many knew the backup quarter A.J. McCarron, could not keep this teams Super Bowl hopes alive. The city didn’t lose hope though. They thought if McCarron could take them far enough into the playoff, Dalton could come back and lead them to their first championship. But now it’s time to talk about the 2015 Wild Card game. Where they would face the Pittsburgh Steelers.
The Gutter
A couple notes before the game itself because we need some major players of the story to be introduced.
Adam Jones (Bengals) – Adam “Pacman” Jones was a cornerback that had a less than stellar off-field persona. I'll just link his Wikipedia page about legal issues because there are a couple. .
Vontaze Burfict (Bengals) – A linebacker that the Bengals signed in 2012. Although he had no off-field issues like Jones, Burfict incited a lot, I mean a lot, of controversy over his play style. He broke the playe...
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