Shootout At The Ohio Corral

Anyone catch the Cleveland Browns versus Cincinnati Bengals defensive masterpiece? Okay, so it wasn’t defensive at all, but it was still pretty darn entertaining. The Browns put up 51 points, the Bengals put up 45 points. Wow. There were twelve touchdowns and four field goals in the 96 point game that was in the balance right until the final seconds. There was a stunning 1085 yards of offense – 531 yards for Cincinnati, and 554 yards for Cleveland. Some of the individual numbers from the game were gaudy… For the Brownies, Derek Anderson may have only completed 20 passes, but five of them were for touchdowns, and they totaled 328 yards. Braylon Edwards caught two of the touchdown passes and had 146 yards; Kellen Winslow caught one of those touchdowns and had exactly 100 yards, and Joe Jurevicius caught just four passes but two of them were touchdowns. On the ground for Cleveland, Jamal Lewis ate up a massive 215 yards on 28 carries, highlighted by a 66-yard touchdown run, and another 47-yard gain off left tackle. Josh Cribbs had an 85-yard kick return, that the Browns converted into six points three plays later; but he also had a 97-yard kickoff return that got called back for a penalty. In a losing cause for the Bengals, Carson Palmer had SIX touchdown passes and a monster 401 yards on 33 receptions (50 attempts)! Chad Johnson caught two of those touchdowns and had 209 yards on eleven receptions. T.J. Houshmandzadeh also had two touchdown receptions, and Rudy Johnson and Glenn Holt both had a touchdown each. Johnson also had 118 yards for the Bengals on the ground on 23 carries. The Bengals actually had a chance to take the game total over 100 points and win the game when they got the ball back with just over a minute to go. They had no timeouts left though, and Palmer ended up getting picked off with about 20 seconds to go. It’s only the third time in NFL history that both quarterbacks have thrown five or more touchdown passes each. I’m sure this game will be on NFL replay this week, despite the fact that there wasn’t a stitch of defense, so if you like offensive football games, make sure you catch it. Surprisingly, it’s not the highest score total between the two teams as they had a similar game in 2004 that ended up with 106 points at 58-48 Bengals. That’s a whole touchdown less than the NFL record of 113 points put up in 1966. Washington fans should know that – it was a 72-41 pasting of the Giants by our beloved…