Just To Mess With Their Fans' Heads, Bengals Bring In Larry Johnson

Feeling pretty good about that 7-2 record, Bengal backers? In the AFC North driver's seat with a very favorable schedule ahead? Well, Mike Brown can definitely change that. What your team needs is a fourth-string RB with an attitude problem!

The Bengals have spent years trying to shed the perception that they are nothing but violent, drug-addled thugs who have little interest in playing proper football—-and now that they've done that, they are actually a good team again. I hate to sound like Gregg Easterbrook here, but ... why would you tempt fate like this? Coach Marvin Lewis says that if the team does sign Johnson, he would be nothing more than a fourth-string back up. Why fill such an inconsequential spot with a potential problem child? Because fourth RBs are so hard to come by?

Let's be clear, Larry Johnson wasn't fired from the Chiefs because he called someone a "faggot" on Twitter. He was dumped because he was an aging, unlikeable, not-very-good running back who had become an annoying thorn in his coach's side. The fact that he threw around anti-gay slurs in public was just a convenient excuse for K.C. to wash their hands of him. He was a distraction that an 0-and-whatever team did not need. So why does a first-place team need it?

I don't believe in football gods, but I do believe that guys who wear hats like this should probably stay unemployed.

Source: Larry Johnson expects to sign with Cincinnati Bengals [ESPN]