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How much longer can the Bengals keep Marvin Lewis?
It was a big move for the Cincinnati Bengals to retain coach Marvin Lewis after his 13th season, despite his team's failure to win a playoff game for the fifth-straight year.
It's looking like that critical decision was a mistake — it doesn’t appear that Lewis will lead the Bengals to a sixth straight playoff appearance this season. The Bengals are now 2-4 on the season and would need an incredible turnaround to work their way into the postseason.
Cincinnati is only a game back of a playoff spot — they’re still in the hunt — but they’re yet to show that they’re a playoff-worthy team in 2016.
Talent isn’t the issue with the Bengals — it’s discipline.
The same issue that cost them last season’s playoff game to the Steelers.
Said Lewis after Sunday's loss to the Patriots: “We continue to be our own Achilles heel."
The notion that Lewis didn’t realize he was self-incriminating himself was a flabbergasting lack of awareness.
It’s Lewis’ job to create a culture of discipline — both assignment and temperamental — and that responsibility has either been shirked or Lewis is no longer capable of reaching his team.
Both are equally fireable offenses.
Considering the uneasy footing Lewis entered the season on, the next two weeks should determine the coach’s fate in Cincinnati. A loss to the Browns next week would be unacceptable, and the following week’s game in London against Washington seems a perfect litmus test for the team.
Losses in either game should seal Lewis’s fate.
Even in an AFC where nine wins are probably enough to make the playoffs, Lewis’ tenure in Cincinnati should be precarious at best. The Bengals are stuck in neutral, and the organization’s fear should no longer be that removing Lewis could tear the team apart, but rather that keeping him around might put the team in reverse.
There’s no shame in losing to the Patriots, at the Bengals did Sunday — and to be fair, the Bengals have played as tough a schedule as any team in the league — but the product that’s being put on the field can’t be pinned to Andy Dalton failures or defensive injuries. This is a team does not have the same swagger as last year’s team.
You only need to see the number in the loss column — four in 16 last year, four in six this campaign — to understand why Lewis' time in Cincinnati could be nearing an end.
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