'Cardiac Cats' Have It This Year

It’s hard to describe, but you know it when you see it. When a team is somehow greater than the sum of its parts, and wins game that they have no business winning. When a group of guys have “it”—that intangible quality, that gives you all the little bounces and penalties and big plays when you need them most—there’s no telling what they can do.

Every year, there’s a different surprise team in the NFL that proves this phenomenon. And this year, it’s the Bengals. The “Cardiac Cats” have won all of their games in the final minutes of the fourth quarter, and at least three of them should have been losses. And yet, they won.

They just keep winning. And when their defensive coordinator, Mike Zimmer, had his wife tragically and suddenly pass away this past week, you just knew the Bengals were going to find a way to get the win this week against Baltimore. They have it this year, and whatever it is—karma, luck, swagger, whatever you want to call it—might just carry them a lonnnng way.

(The other team with “it” this year? The Denver Broncos, who, if you’ll remember played the Bengals in Week One. What happens when two teams with this intangible quality face off? Well, the world nearly explodes, and naturally, Gus Johnson is prominently involved.)