All for one

First-year head coach Lewis out to change Bengals' stripes

GEORGETOWN, Ky. -- There was a moment late in Wednesday morning's practice at the Bengals' training camp when everyone in attendance -- at least those within shouting distance -- finally and fully understood just what Marvin Lewis means by his "one voice" approach to leading an organization.

In Cincinnati, the voice you hear these days unmistakably belongs to Lewis, and in this instance the Bengals' new head coach was using it at full throttle to drive home a message to underachieving defensive end Reinard Wilson -- and to the rest of his teammates by association.

"We've got too many selfish people on this team," Lewis thundered, after Wilson pushed an offensive lineman into Shane Matthews at the end of one play, violating the Bengals' no-contact-in-practice rule for quarterbacks. "Defensive line, you're being selfish and you're putting us at risk. That's just like hitting the quarterback late. It's a selfish play."

They say a journey of a 1,000 miles starts with one step, and by that measurement Lewis is only a few paces or so into his gargantuan task of turning around the Bengals, the NFL's reigning laughingstock franchise. Given his long-awaited first head coaching opportunity seven months ago, Lewis is hard at work here at Georgetown College, using any available means and method to continue the mindset transplant that he is undertaking in Cincinnati.

"We know we're not supposed to be around the quarterback, and yet we still do it," Lewis said later, looking back on his midfield tirade at Wilson. "We've been down this road before. It's something from what people have told me the team has struggled with, how to practice. In order to be a good team in the NFL, you have to learn how to practice.

"You have to practice at game tempo and you have to do it where everyone stays on their feet and you allow the quarterback to deliver the football on time, and yet you work your wares on defense. You've got to be able to do your job on defense, isolate the pass rush or whatever and then pull out of it. And you don't get guys tangled up. When you play selfishly, on any side of that, that same selfishness comes out on Sundays, and then you beat yourself."

The bedraggled Bengals, of course, have been experts at beating themselves for the past 12 years, all of which have been non-winning seasons. If Lewis has any hope of getting Cincinnati to do things correctly on game day, it starts here, on the sweaty practice fields of training camp. With dozens of little lessons every day, as he molds, cajoles and challenges a team that went 2-14 last season, and is an NFL-worst 19-61 in the past five years.

In truth, last year's Bengals are gone, gone, gone. With nine new coaches and more than 30 new names on the roster, Cincinnati this season is a melting pot of sorts, a chemistry experiment that is far from concluded. Lewis likes most of what he has seen so far, especially in terms of the team's defense, which has a chance to be pretty good. But progress may come in fits and starts, with Lewis constantly having to beat back the Bengals' past until his team comes together and does the heavy lifting for itself.

"Oh, the players are buying in, but we're going to have still some addition by subtraction," said Lewis, a clear indication that not every key player is already on board from the genesis of his program. "That's when we'll gain even more guys. We're definitely gaining guys. There's no question that we're gaining believers doing it the right way. We got a group now that if you don't play hard, you stand out."

I asked Lewis point-blank how many starters he had that he knew he could count on. On defense, he named a bunch: Kevin Hardy, Tory James, John Thornton, Carl Powell, Duane Clemons, Brian Simmons and Jeff Burris. On offense? "Offensively, we're not the same," he said. "Right now we've got two. We got Willie Anderson and we got Reggie Kelly. They're the only guys I can count on right now. But we've got some great candidates."

You might have noticed, that Lewis did not list franchise running back Corey Dillon among the guys he's ready to go to war with. That was no oversight. Though Lewis has made some inroads with the perpetually disgruntled star, the two are by no means guaranteed of having a long-term relationship at this point. As the Takeo Spikes situation this offseason was instructive of, Lewis is convinced that only happy campers make productive players and dependable pieces of the puzzle.

Asked if it was vital to have Dillon fully on board, Lewis offered a potentially telling assessment: "Oh, I don't know. We'll see. I don't want to put any stock in that. I can't put stock in that yet. ... If he doesn't do it the right way, and that's going to be the defining mode of this football team, we won't miss a beat. He says the right things to me, but I see better than I hear."

In the next breath, Lewis added: "Corey's a fine player and Corey is a great aid to us. And we've got to use him and we're going to use him. But we just want all cylinders working together, as much as we can."

Simmons, an outside linebacker, is uniquely qualified to compare the old Bengals to Lewis' Bengals, given that he arrived in 1998, the year Cincinnati began its 19-61 run. From his vantage point internally, he believes it's a new era in Bengals football. But he realizes only victories will convince the masses.

"It's a new era, but it hasn't arrived yet," he said Wednesday, catching his breath in the minutes after the morning workout. "That's going to be up to us. It's going to be about what we get done on the field, and that's going to dictate everything. Right now we're definitely headed in the right direction and we're doing the right things, but we still have to win games to get this thing turned around."

As many changes as Lewis brought to the team, with upgraded strength and conditioning programs, new weight room additions, and scouting staff increases, there's plenty more work to do on that front to bring Cincinnati fully up to NFL standards. But before he can fight for another round of change, first he has to win some games, in order to establish legitimacy both within and outside the organization.

This season Lewis is laying the foundation upon which he hopes to build, and a 7-9 or 8-8 record, especially if the Bengals are week-in and week-out competitive, should give him almost carte blanche to further his vision.

"We're doing things as I know to do them, but from what I hear there's a lot of change," Lewis said. "I don't know that, until some one says that's different from what they've always done. There are things that [team owner/president] Mike [Brown] just wanted to hold onto, so we had some give and take that way.

"But I'm happy with where we are, and the coaching of the team. And as successful as we are and the strides we take this year, we gain credibility in everything we want to do and how we want to do it. That's the important thing."

The important thing, say Bengals veterans, is that Marvin Lewis is on hand, and that hope has at last arrived.

"With his energy came a whole new era," said Clemons, a free-agent signee at defensive end. "It's kind of like the dark clouds are starting to part and you're starting to see the sun peeking through. Now I know once we win a few games, sooner or later that old Bengals reputation will just fade away."

That would be a switch. Around here, the Bengals usually do the fading.

Don Banks covers pro football for SI.com.

 

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