If Gandalf coached the Bengals for this week's game

As I was watching Sunday night's painful Bengals loss to the Jets -- a game best characterized as a good ol' fashioned ass whooping -- I was forced to avert my eyes from the embarrassment and watch the Lord of the Rings: Return of the King on TNT. I would turn back to the Bengals game and shake my head in shame during commercials until the 3rd Quarter, when I couldn't watch any longer and focused my full attention on Frodo. This lead to an inspirational conversations with @armonde on Twitter, which lead me to ask, "how would Gandalf coach the Bengals this week?"

1. First, as indicated in the tweet above, Gandalf supports a running game. In the mines of Moria when Gandalf forbade the Balrog from crossing the bridge, he made it clear: "You shall not pass!" The great white wizard would never encourage Frodo to recklessly pass the ring to Sam in the face of a sizeable Orc offensive line. Slow and steady wins the race in Gandalf's book, and he knows that if you depend on your most reliable guys, they'll come through for you.
2. Gandalf doesn't suffer fools on defense. Remember at the walls of Minas Tirith, when he was waving around his staff and telling the soldiers to get their asses back to the wall and not let anyone through. Or, when he knew some unspeakable monster was about to break down the gates, but he told the defenders they would stand their ground regardless? Yeah, Bengals, you need to do that. For serious. 
3. Gandalf supports trick plays. Remember when he cleverly smuggled his staff into the palace in The Two Towers to remove the curse from Theoden, King of Rohan? Bengals, Gandalf would tell you to use trick plays to "draw out the Jets defense, like poison from a wound!" And, those of us watching the game on the teevee, we'd enjoy that too. God knows, we've suffered enough from Bengals shenanigans in 2010.

Using Gandalf's strategies, I think the Bengals could have a good shot at victory. And that is necessary, because I can't handle another game like Sunday's. Worst case scenario, I'll check to see if Harry Potter is on ABC Family.

Awesome photo above found on www.sodahead.com. Seriously, and awesome photo.