If the Bengals think they've had it tough so far while having to rip victories from the jowls of their adversaries, they haven't seen anything yet.
The Houston Texans gave the Bengals a reality check, and they took away some of their might as injuries befell a pair of Cincinnati defensive standouts during a 28-17 drama-free football game at Paul Brown Stadium.
"That’s a big win," Texans coach Gary Kubiak said. "We came in here against a heck of a football team. We made our share of mistakes, but were able to come out on top."
The Cardiac Cats never got on the operating table on Sunday. They were dead on arrival. And there was no need for any end-game heroics. What's more, injuries continued to mount, especially on the defensive side, as standout linemen Antwan Odom and Domata Peko were knocked out of the game with injuries.
Both players got hurt in the first quarter. That meant the Bengals defense, already weakened by the deactivation of starting strong safety Roy Williams with a bruised forearm, played the final three quarters missing three of its most physically imposing starters against an explosive Texans offense. The Cincinnati defense entered play Sunday giving up more 20-yard plays (24) than any team in the league.
As expected, it didn't work out so well for the Bengals, who had their feel-good four-game winning streak snapped while falling back to earth and into a tie atop the AFC North standings with Pittsburgh.
Odom's injury late in the first quarter appeared to be the most severe, with possible long-term consequences. The defensive end, an early leader in the NFL sacks race with eight, was carted off the field after suffering an Achilles’ tendon injury on Houston's 12-yard touchdown pass from Matt Schaub to Owen Daniels with 48 seconds left in the quarter. The training staff felt Odom's lower left leg when they met him on the field and called for the cart.
"He has an Achilles injury — probably pretty severe — but we won’t know that exactly until they (look at it) further," Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis said of the injury, most likely a tendon tear.
Odom, who blocked Kris Brown's 28-yard field goal attempt on Houston's first possession, would be a big loss for the Bengals if he were to miss any significant period of time with this latest injury.
At Alabama, Odom's sophomore season was ended after having surgery on a torn labrum in his left shoulder. Odom missed 12 games with a knee injury his third NFL season while with Tennessee. Last year in his first season with Cincinnati after signing a big contract during free-agency, Odom suffered two injuries that caused him to miss time. He missed the entire 2008 preseason with a foot injury suffered during the first day of training camp. He was inactive for four games during the regular season with a shoulder injury suffered during practice.
For several years, Odom suffered from sleep apnea, often resorting to wearing a nasal mask at night to help him breathe. After the death of NFL Hall of Famer Reggie White at age 43, which sleep apnea contributed to, Odom underwent surgery, in 2005, to remove abnormal tonsils.
The Bengals lost defensive tackle Domata Peko to a knee injury earlier in the first quarter on Sunday. When Odom went down, both the Bengals and the Texans were working undermanned in the trenches as Houston was missing its two starting guards, both out for the season with injuries.
The Bengals also were missing injured backup defensive lineman Frostee Rucker, this after starting defensive tackle Tank Johnson missed time with an injury. Johnson made his return Sunday and had three tackles on what is now an injury-depleted Bengals defensive front that may be relying on Jonathan Fanene and Pat Sims at one tackle spot - both had a sack against the Texans - and rookie Michael Johnson at end.
"We were undermanned, big time. But, that’s just the game. Guys are going to go down. Guys are going to get hurt," Tank Johnson said. "It’s frustrating when you are undermanned. It’s hard, but life is hard. We have to push through that and make it happen. I know what those guys are dealing with. Being injured is not fun. Anytime they are bringing out a cart for you, it’s never a good thing. When you see guys go down, other guys have to step up and make plays. None of that negates the fact that we have to hustle to the ball and tackle. No matter if everyone goes down, hustling to the ball and tackling is still a fundamental part of this game and we have to do better.”
The Texans seemed to handle adversity along the line better than the Bengals, who weren't able to generate much pressure on Schaub, a gun-slinging quarterback at his best when he has time to survey the field.
Schaub, with an ineffective running game behind him, started throwing from jump-street and completed 70 percent of his passes for 392 yards and a career-high-tying four touchdowns. It was his fourth 300-yard passing game of the season, and the second biggest passing yardage day of his career. One of Schaub's scoring tosses on a screen pass went to tailback Steve Slaton, who made up for his continued lack of production running the football (43 yards on 19 carries) by catching six passes for 102 yards.
All-Pro Andre Johnson broke the Bengals' hex on No. 1 receivers by also going over the 100-yard mark, with 135 yards on eight catches, many of them on screen passes.
"Maybe they caught us a little offguard with some of their screens,” Bengals safety Chris Crocker said.
Daniels had seven receptions for 78 yards and a pair of touchdowns. Daniels, yet another tight end who has exploited the Bengals' defense, scored on the Texans' first scoring drive of the day with less than a minute left in the opening quarter, and then again on their last scoring drive with 2:29 to play in the third quarter.
Jacoby Jones' 23-yard TD catch with 11:23 to go in the third quarter and Brown's extra-point kick wiped out a 17-14 Bengals halftime advantage and gave the Texans the lead for good, 21-17.
The Texans relied on the pass so much that Bengals cornerback Leon Hall (12 tackles) and Roy Williams' replacement, Chinedum Ndukwe (10), ranked first and third in tackles for the Bengals on Sunday.
Not at their best after an emotional road win in Baltimore, and with so many defensive difference-makers on the bench against Houston, the Bengals were outgained 472-296, in total yards, 235-78 in the second half. The Bengals had just two first downs in the third quarter. And Cincinnati was nearly as sluggish as the Texans on the ground, averaging just 2.7 yards a carry on the way to just 86 rushing yards. Cedric Benson entered the game as the NFL's rushing leader. He exited a stopped a man, with 44 yards on 16 carries.
Chad Ochocinco was the Bengals' primary offensive weapon with five catches for 103 yards.
The Bengals scored all their points in the second quarter. Benson's 10-yard touchdown run and Shayne Graham's kick tied the score 7-7 with 11:33 remaining in the second quarter. Carson Palmer hit a tip-toeing Laveranues Coles in the back of the end zone for an 8-yard touchdown pass with 48 seconds left before halftime.
Graham received his long snaps from newly-signed former Texan, Clark Harris, after 10-year veteran long-snapper Brad St. Louis was given the boot earlier in the week following six bad snaps - most of them sailing too high - in five games. Clark to rookie holder Kevin Huber to set up Graham worked just fine on a 50-yard field goal that snapped a 14-14 tie with no time showing on the second-quarter clock.
The Bengals have scored 54 of their 118 points in the last two minutes of a half or overtime. On the season, their opponents also have scored 118 points, which shows just how close the Bengals really are to mediocrity, despite their surprising 4-2 record.
Graham's go-ahead boot was set up when the Bengals got the ball back after Coles' scoring grab. Chris Crocker intercepted Schaub on a deep pass to former Bengal Kevin Walter on first down and returned the ball to the Texans' 41.
The Bengals, who had won three straight games in the last 22 seconds, were given a chance for some of their patented late-game heroics when they got the ball back with 6:12 remaining in the game and trailing by 11. Houston was driving in Cincinnati territory and attempting to add to its lead, but Robert Geathers caused Slaton to fumble on a second-and-18 running play from the Cincinnati 19, and Brandon Johnson recovered at the Bengals 29.
But, two plays later, Palmer completed a pass over the middle to tight end J.P. Foschi, who was pounced on by Texans and had the ball ripped from his hands by rookie linebacker Brian Cushing. Bernard Pollard picked up the loose football at the Bengals 41.
The Bengals' issues at tight end, another position beset by a string of injuries, haunted them when yet another fumble by tight end Daniel Coats set up Houston's final touchdown. That pushed the Texans' lead from a reachable 4 points, to 11.
The Bengals forced the Texans (3-3) to punt four plays after Foschi lost the handle and got the ball back at their own 20 with 3:37 left, plenty of time for Palmer (23-for-35 passing for 259 yards) to pull another rabbit out of his hat. Palmer, playing with a cast on his left thumb and a glove on his left (non-passing) hand to support a sprained thumb suffered in Baltimore, completed 4-of-5 passes for 51 yards down to the Houston 26, where the Cardiac Cats had it first-and-10.
Needing a field goal, a touchdown and a successful two-point conversion to tie the score 28-all, Palmer threw his only interception of the day as Cushing jumped the pass route and snared it at the Houston 11 before being brought down with 1:48 to go.
And that, said Pooh, was that. Houston shut out its third straight opponent in the second half.
"Obviously turnovers hurt us. Anytime you turn the ball over three times as a team, you’re not going to give yourselves a good chance to win," Palmer said. "We had a number of things go wrong, whether it was a turnover or a missed block. It was just poor execution across the board. It’s a tough game to lose and a tough pill to swallow, especially after the way we felt the last few weeks.”
On Sunday, there was no Bengals rally, no Bengals win, no 5-1 start to the season and an evaporated lead in the division standings, with a handful of defensive stars out of action, perhaps for a while.
"To sum up the day, we didn’t get any points and we lost the field position battle, particularly in the second half," coach Lewis said. "We put our offense in a bad position. Just about every possession, we started out somewhere between the 20 and the 30, at best. Defensively, the two scores in the second half by Houston put us behind. We hadn’t gotten back in the game at the end of the first half, but we didn’t get enough going offensively and the fumbles (hurt) us."
The Bengals have had it tough so far in what has promised to be a breakthrough season in Cincinnati. But that road to the team's second playoff appearance in 19 years just got rougher.
How the Bengals handle this disappointing home loss and this latest round of adversity in the form of serious injuries to star players will go a long way toward answering this bigger question: Can the Bengals sustain their early-season success and stay in the playoff hunt with Pittsburgh and Baltimore no doubt nipping at their heels the entire way?
We're about to find out.
Next up: The Chicago Bears on Sunday at PBS.
"We need to stay focused," Palmer said. "We have a really good team coming in here next week before a bye, so we need to get ourselves to 5-2 heading into the bye week.”