About Cincinnati Bengals
American Football League
National Football League
The Cincinnati Bengals are a professional American football team based in Cincinnati. The Bengals compete in the National Football League as a member club of the league's American Football Conference North division. The club's home games are held in downtown Cincinnati at Paycor Stadium.
Former Cleveland Browns head coach Paul Brown began planning for the creation of the Bengals franchise in 1965, and Cincinnati's city council approved the construction of Riverfront Stadium in 1966. Finally, in 1967, the Bengals were founded when a group headed by Brown received franchise approval by the American Football League on May 23, 1967, and they began play in the 1968 season. Brown was the Bengals' head coach from their inception to 1975. After being dismissed as the Browns' head coach by Art Modell in January 1963, Brown had shown interest in establishing another NFL franchise in Ohio and looked at both Cincinnati and Columbus. He ultimately chose the former when a deal between the city, Hamilton County, and Major League Baseball's Cincinnati Reds was struck that resulted in an agreement to build a multipurpose stadium which could host both baseball and football games. Due to the impending merger of the AFL and the NFL, which was scheduled to take full effect in the 1970 season, Brown agreed to join the AFL as its 10th and final franchise. The Bengals, like the other former AFL teams, were assigned to the AFC following the merger. Cincinnati was also selected because, like their neighbors the Reds, they could draw from several large neighboring cities that are all no more than 110 miles away from downtown Cincinnati, along with Indianapolis, until the Baltimore Colts relocated there prior to the 1984 NFL season. After Paul Brown's death in 1991, controlling interest in the team was inherited by his son, Mike Brown. In 2011, Brown purchased shares of the team owned by the estate of co-founder Austin Knowlton and is now the majority owner of the Bengals franchise.
The Bengals won the AFC championship in 1981, 1988, and in 2021. After the first two conference championships, they lost to the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowls XVI and XXIII. The 1990s and the early 2000s were a period of great struggle. During that era they were occasionally referred to as "The Bungles," a term coined by Steelers broadcaster Myron Cope, due to their struggles and poor performance. Following the 1990 season, the team went 14 years without posting a winning record, during which time the team did not qualify to play in the NFL playoffs. The Bengals had several head coaches, and several of their top draft picks did not pan out. The team does not have an official general manager. However, Duke Tobin is often, though incorrectly, referred to as the Bengals' general manager because he handles most personnel decisions. In a 2011 survey, Brown was rated as among the worst team owners in American professional sports. The team's fortunes improved in the mid-2000s and they continued up until the mid-2010s, which saw them become more consistent postseason contenders, but they continued to struggle past the regular season. The turning point for the Bengals was during the 2021 season, when they won their first playoff game in 31 years and made back-to-back AFC Championship games. In 2021, they defeated the Kansas City Chiefs 27–24 in overtime and advanced to Super Bowl LVI, their first appearance in the Super Bowl in 33 years, but this time, they lost to the Los Angeles Rams 23–20. The following season in 2022, they also made the AFC Championship game but lost to the eventual Super Bowl champions, the Chiefs, at the same exact score as in Super Bowl LVI.
In a Forbes article on the value of NFL teams as of August 2022, the Cincinnati Bengals were ranked last with a value of $3 billion.
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