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The ship has sailed on an Andrew Whitworth return to the Cincinnati Bengals — but the modern franchise legend has kept his finger on the pulse of the organization as it gets ready to kickstart the Joe Burrow era.
Whitworth went over a broad range of topics about his time in Cincinnati and how he feels about the Burrow era Tuesday on The Herd with Colin Cowherd.
Whitworth noted he’s more worried about the AFC North than the fact Burrow will land with the Bengals — and he’s not too concerned about it, really.
“…the bigger concern is the division…with a rookie quarterback you’re going to have a lot of expectation…in some ways I love the matchup because you look at his career and the adversity he’s had to face…they’re gonna need a guy that’s got a little bit of an attitude.”
He also touched on how much cash the Bengals spent in free agency, starting with a funny joke:
“The first thing I make is it makes me aggravated…I think it’s a good message…I think they know they’re about to pick a kid in Joe Burrow who is special…We need to make sure that this kid understands we’re committed to trying to win. I think the commitment they’re showing there to Zac Taylor and bringing in a young quarterback like that, it tells me all the way they’re going with Joe Burrow.”
“I think at times in the past that’s what you felt. You felt there like ‘hey we gotta draft perfectly, we gotta raise up every single draft pick perfectly, the coaches gotta do an amazing job…”
Whitworth couldn’t be more correct, from the past up-and-down nature of how the team approached roster building to the shocking unorthodox nature of this offseason as the team gets ready to build around Burrow’s rookie contract.
One could keep playing the “what if” game with Whitworth, yet he probably wouldn’t be sitting here in an interview commending the Bengals for changing if his bad departure from the team hadn’t helped spur some long-term change.
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