It was a day when two Bengals especially – wide receiver Mohamed Sanu and defensive tackle Devon Still – earned their stripes.
As Sanu stood bare-chested in front of his locker after the Cincinnati Bengals had overpowered the Falcons 24-10 at Paul Brown Stadium on Sunday, you couldn’t help but notice his muscular upper left arm and shoulder were covered with tiger stripes – the same kind he and his teammates have on their orange helmets.
“I got them the last offseason,” he said. “I love tigers – the animals – and me and my best friends decided a long time ago we’d get them when we finally started earning our stripes.”
As he looked at the ink work now, he couldn’t help but smile: “I think I earned some of them today.”
The Bengals were without three of their top receivers. Wide receiver Marvin Jones and tight end Tyler Eifert didn’t dress because of injury. And on Cincinnati’s first possession, All-Pro wide receiver A.J. Green was lost with a damaged right toe.
Last year that trio accounted for 209 catches, 2,847 yards and 23 touchdowns,.
“We had a lot of guys hurt so the next guy had to step up and make some plays,” said Sanu, a third-year backup for the Bengals. “For us to win, other guys would have to make plays.”
And no one did it in more dynamic fashion than Sanu.
On the first play of their second possession, the Bengals resorted to a little trickery. Sanu came around on the reverse, got the ball from quarterback Andy Dalton and then suddenly stopped, set his feet and heaved a perfectly thrown 50-yard pass, through double coverage, right into the waiting fingertips of teammate Brandon Tate just before he stepped out of bounds.
“He’s thrown three passes in the NFL now and completed all three,” a smiling Andy Dalton said as he stood at the adjoining locker and shook his head. “You can’t get any better than that. He’s perfect.”
So was Dalton in the third quarter when he picked up an all-out Falcons blitz and unloaded the ball over the middle to Sanu, who had a step on Falcons cornerback Robert Alford, caught the ball at belt level and then sprinted down the wide-open field on a 76-yard touchdown play.
Bengals coach Marvin Lewis called it the play of the game.
“My number got called today and I had to answer,” Sanu said.
Across the dressing room, Still sat at his locker surrounded by the team’s other massive lineman. In his lap, he held a bright orange poster that said “Be Leah Strong!”
When Brandon Thompson, the Bengals backup nose tackle was knocked out of the game with an injury, Still, who hadn’t played since mid-December last year, was asked to fill in and he did so admirably Lewis said afterward.
“You could see this big smile (today),” Lewis said. “It was great.”
No one had the entire stadium – including the opposing Falcons – pulling for him any more than did Still.
His 4-year-old daughter Leah is battling stage IV pediatric cancer. He’s been at her side through the battle and the ordeal began to get national attention last month when the Bengals released him on cut-down day and then picked him up again the next day and put him on their practice squad – partly because he could help them as he did Sunday and partly because he could keep his medical insurance.
Sunday morning Lewis told Still he’d be part of the active roster and the first person he called was Leah, who is in the hospital back in Philadelphia.
“She was getting out of the hospital today after she first watched herself on the (ESPN) NFL Countdown show,” he said with a smile. “When I called her, she said, ‘Dad, I’m on TV.’ “
And then he told her he would be, too: “When coach Lewis let me know I was up today I called to let her know to watch the game.”
Leah not only would watch her dad make three tackles Sunday, but she would see the outpouring of support for her all around the stadium.
“This sign,” Still said of the one that now rested gently in those same beefy hands that had pulled Falcon ballcarriers to the turf, “this sign was brought in by one of our trainers who said a fan wanted me to have it.”
After the game many of the Falcon players sought out Still as the two teams shook hands on the field.
“They all came up to me and said they respected what I was doing,” he said, “They said they’d continued to pray for us and they asked if there’s anything they could do to help out my situation.”
If you go to Bengals.com, you can buy a No. 75 jersey that says STILL on the back for $100. And every cent of that money goes to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center.
As of Friday, 4,000 had been sold. New Orleans Saints coach Sean Payton ordered 100 of them. NFL quarterback Brady Quinn ordered some, as did ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt, who bought 20 and asked that they be handed out to kids getting treatment at Children’s.
“Words can’t begin to describe what I feel,” a visibly-moved Still said after the game. “It’s amazing to see this kind of support. I never expected it. When your child has cancer, it’s a hard thing to go through by yourself. People have been too good to us.
“And I can’t tell you what Leah’s done for me. She’s teaching me about strength. No matter what she’s facing, she has a smile. I’m learning from her every day.”
Back across the room Sanu said the same thing about his mother, Aminata Koroma, who had fled civil war in her native Sierra Leone in 1975 and come to America. She gave birth to Mohamed and his sister here and returned with them in 1993 for three years. Eventually Mohamed came back here and was raised by various people, ending up in New Jersey.
His mom returned to help her homeland and has done everything there from run an orphanage to get scholarships and food for kids.
Sanu has sent some of the money he’s made as a Bengal over to her to help the kids there.
Now Sierra Leone is ravaged by Ebola and finally two weeks ago, Sanu brought his mother back to New Jersey to keep her safe for a while.
“She’ll go back though because that’s where her heart is,” he said.
As for Still, his heart was back with his little girl and right there on the PBS field with his teammates Sunday.
“It was amazing to finally play again,” he said.” It’s been a long road since last season with all the injuries and then everything that’s happened with my daughter. To be on the football field with my teammates, to hear the crowd cheering and see all the different signs for my daughter, it was a great feeling.
“Something special happened out there today.”
He, too, earned his stripes.
