Brown: Scott, Pickens must step up Wednesday, August 12, 1998
BY GEOFF HOBSON
The Cincinnati Enquirer
CENTERVILLE, Ohio -- Bengals President Mike Brown has called on Carl Pickens and Darnay Scott, his two big money receivers, to start making some big plays, too.
Carl Pickens and Darnay Scott have to make big plays, says Mike Brown.
(Ernest Coleman photo)
| ZOOM |"Our receivers have to ratchet it up a gear or two," Brown said before Tuesday's practice here at Centerville High School. "We think they can. They have in the past. It's time for them to start getting serious and and get down to brass tacks. I think they will."
Brown said, "There were some things we weren't real happy about" in last Saturday's exhibition opener against the Giants, a 24-17 loss where most of the receivers struggled. Scott dropped a Jeff Blake pass and Pickens either slipped or got pushed on a play that ended up in the first of Blake's two interceptions.
"It's simple," Brown said. "If you don't make the big catches, you don't score."
Unlike some of the team's fans who are now preparing for another four-month death march, Brown took heart from a game film that wasn't all that bad in his eyes.
"We had individual guys dropping the ball and throwing it to the other team," Brown said. "But when you look at all the other people, they were doing all right for the most part."
Brown came home impressed with the club's 1998 draft, particularly his pair of first-round inside linebackers, Takeo Spikes and Brian Simmons. Throw in the athleticism third-rounder Steve Foley displayed at outside linebacker against the Giants' reserves, and Brown finally thinks he has the core of a solid 3-4 defense.
"The rookie linebackers are quick, they are fast," Brown said. "It will take a while for them to fit in and to learn and to get the experience. When they do, we'll have something that will be special. We're convinced pretty well we have the makings of a first-rate group of linebackers, not just (Spikes and Simmons), but across the board."
Yet there's no doubt, the club is concerned about its high-octane offense and who is going run it. Blake? Neil O'Donnell? Paul Justin?
"It concerns me in the sense we know we'll only go as far as the quarterback who takes us," Brown said. "One of the quarterbacks is going to have to rise up and establish himself to make the team go the way we think it can go. Until that happens, the question will be bubbling."
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