Monday, December 17, 2001
Akili earns another look
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Akili Smith is no longer a bust, except, perhaps, for his left hamstring. He moved up on the depth chart from washout to Watch Out Sunday, beguiling the Cincinnati Bengals with the most polished play of his professional career. But just as Smith was bringing some definition to the Bengals' amorphous quarterback picture, the screen went all fuzzy again.
If Sunday's 15-14 loss to the New York Jets is to be the final exam on Smith's future, his grade would have to be an incomplete. He led the Bengals to their longest scoring drive of the year — 20 plays, 12 minutes — on the first possession of his first start of the season, but he was unable to convert a first down on two subsequent possessions before he left the field on the back of a cart.
Smith did enough to provide encouragement, but not so much that the Bengals can be confident they have found a franchise quarterback. He did enough to reveal Bob Trumpy as an irresponsible blowhard, but not so much that more temperate critics will be issuing retractions. He showed delicious promise, but not definitive proof.
It was an enticing tease, but ultimately frustrating. If Smith is finished for the season, as his pain tells him is probable, the Bengals will have hard decisions to make and a fairly flimsy set of facts on which to make them. Management is painfully familiar with Jon Kitna's limitations, but it can no longer say with quite as much certainty if Akili Smith can become a playoff-caliber quarterback or is destined to disappoint.
Can be handful
He has been hurried. He has been buried. He has been slow to adjust and (at least against Cleveland) he has been ill-prepared. Yet when Smith can operate an offense tailored to his talents, as he did Sunday, he is a bona-fide handful.
“If you blitz the guy, he's going to kill you,” Bengals fullback Lorenzo Neal said. “They can't bring as much (defensive) pressure because if they do, he'll find a seam and beat you with his legs.”
Watching Kitna from the sidelines this season, one of the things that struck Smith was the amount of running room available to the quarterback. While this is a weapon that tends to open holes between the tackles and unclog passing lanes, the sword is double-edged. The running quarterback creates an additional threat, but also exposes himself to injuries.
Smith felt his hamstring pop Sunday during second-quarter run, while being sandwiched by Jets safeties Victor Green and Damien Robinson. When Smith left Giants Stadium Sunday, it was with a pair of crutches. When the Bengals returned to Cincinnati Sunday night, Smith was planning on a magnetic resonance imaging test to determine the extent of the damage.
“It's real disappointing,” he said. “I'm at a loss for words. I don't know what's going on around this place. I really don't. I get in and we score on the first drive and things are going so well and the next thing you know my hamstring pops ...
“I proved to a lot of people that I'm still in the race for the quarterback spot. Hopeully, I showed to the organization, to my teammates, to you guys (in the media) that I can lead this team.”
He showed, at least, that it is premature to write him off as a lost cause.
E-mail tsullivan@enquirer.com. Past columns at Enquirer.com/columns/sullivan .
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SULLIVAN: Akili earns another look
