With little to play for, the Cincinnati Bengals were flattened by the New York Jets on Sunday night in the last game of the NFL season, 37-0.  It sets up a rematch with the two teams in the AFC Wildcard Weekend next Saturday at Paul Brown Stadium.

THE GOOD
Rest - The Bengals rested many players for the whole game (Cedric Benson, Chris Crocker, and Demato Peko) and many more for a large portion of it. Aside from Pat Sims, who was lost for the season with broken right forearm, the team made it through the game without any more significant injuries. That’s much better than

Jets Showed More – There’s no doubt the Bengals ran a very vanilla playbook against the Jets. New York was not in that position.  Despite dominating Cincinnati, they in a sense gave the Bengals a sneak peek and two weeks to prepare. In the end, it won’t matter much though. Everybody knows what these teams are going to do – run the ball and D up.

THE BAD
Momentum – While I didn’t expect the Bengals to win on Sunday, I was hoping for a little better display on national television.  The manner upon which the Jets not only beat the Bengals, but completely destroy them on the line scrimmage on both sides of the ball is bound to have lingering effects.

Statistically Speaking – Whether it mattered or not, the fact the Bengals produced just 72 yards of total offense (only 7 yards in first half), including Carson Palmer’s 1-for-11 passing effort for 0 yards and 1 INT. In contrast, the Jets gained 320 total yards, with 257 of it coming on the ground. That’s alarming heading for next week’s playoff rematch.

THE UGLY
Meadowlands Misery – Nobody may be happier than the Bengals that Sunday night was the last-ever game at the Meadowlands.  Cincinnati is 0-10 all-time at Giants Stadium (0-7 vs. NYJ, 0-3 vs. NYG).

QUOTE TO NOTE
“The good thing is we gave ourselves an opportunity to still be in the playoffs, even with losing in the 17th week of the season. We get the chance to play at our facility, in front of our fans, and we will put out a better effort and play much better than we did tonight.” - Bengals’ QB Carson Palmer on the potential of a bounce back next week

NFL cincinnati bengals, new york jets, cedric benson, carson palmer