There's one Bengals training camp battle that NOBODY is talking about...

AtoZ Sports

John Sheeran discusses how the Cincinnati Bengals have a true training camp battle on their hands between long snappers Cal Adomitis and William Wagner!

Transcript

00:00There's a Bengals training camp battle set to commence that no one seems to be talking about,

00:03but in this video, I'll explain why it's very crucial for the coaches to keep a close eye on

00:07this one. Hi again, Bengals fans, John Sheeran of A to Z Sports Cincinnati here. This time next

00:15week, you will have, hopefully, the entire roster of the Cincinnati Bengals in town for the start

00:20of training camp. In an offseason that has felt like a millennium, we are pretty much back. We're

00:25still a few weeks from actual football happening, and then a month and a half from the real football

00:29happening. But guys getting back in town for the start of practice so we can get a glimpse of what

00:34this Bengals team truly looks like, we are pretty much there. And now I think is a really good time

00:37to maybe gauge what's going on in your guys' minds. So please let me know down in the comments any

00:41questions that you would like me to answer in a Q&A video later this week. I will be checking,

00:46and I'll pick out the most interesting ones. Before we get to that, I'm sure there's going

00:49to be questions about potential training camp battles and competitions all over the roster.

00:53And I think that there is one battle that we're not really talking about enough because, let's be

00:58honest, it's a position that no one really talks about at all. But it should be notable that the

01:02Bengals have not one, but two long snappers on their 90-man roster at this moment. You got Cal

01:07Adam Midas, who's been here for a handful of years. Remember, he was an undrafted free agent signing

01:11back in 2022 when Clark Harris is still here. And then he got the call up to the roster in week two

01:15of that year because Clark Harris suffered what ended up being a career-ending injury, and he's been

01:19the long snapper ever since. And joining Adam Midas this offseason is William Wagner, who was the

01:23consensus top-rated long snapper coming out of Michigan this season. And I don't think that

01:28Darren Simmons, who's been the special teams coordinator for the Bengals for the past two

01:31decades, would bring in another long snapper if he didn't have the intention of giving William

01:35Wagner every single chance possible at potentially beating out Cal Adam Midas.

01:40As far as true roster battles go, this is about as 50-50 as you could possibly find. It's two guys

01:45vying for one roster spot. We've seen it in the past with the punter position, and that's how

01:49Ryan Rico ended up beating out Brad Robbins this time last year. And yeah, it's possible

01:53for a guy like Wagner, should he lose and be waived, he can come back to the practice squad

01:57and all that. And that's pretty much what happened with Adam Midas in 2022, but I don't think it

02:01was a true competition back then because they knew exactly what they had in Clark Harris,

02:04and he was a known commodity. I don't really think they had any interest in moving on from

02:08him that soon. And now three years later, I think Adam Midas is going to have to battle for

02:11his job because I think there were a lot of questions last year with the special teams battery

02:15as a whole. Of course, Evan McPherson took a lot of the blame as the kicker who ended up

02:18missing a lot more kicks than he probably should have, especially right after signing a three-year

02:22contract extension. And Rico also had his faults as a holder, and I think that definitely contributed

02:25to at least a handful of some of those misses from McPherson. And I think the timing of the

02:29whole process was off for a lot of the year, and I think part of that stems to Adam Midas not

02:33getting the snap off until really late in the play clock. I think all three of these guys need to

02:36be better, and if you were to say that Adam Midas is the most disposable of the three,

02:40I wouldn't necessarily disagree with that. But the interesting thing to me about this competition

02:43between Adam Midas and Wagner is that the more reps that you split between the two,

02:47you're taking reps away from Adam Midas and giving them to the rookie in Wagner,

02:50and obviously he's only working with Ryan Rico and Evan McPherson in the same two-thirds of the

02:55battery. The more reps that get split between those two, the less chemistry and continuity

02:59I think you were going to find with the original battery. And yeah, it could just be Darren Simmons

03:03saying, hey, here you guys go. It's a free-for-all. You're going to get a 50-50 shot at this,

03:06and whoever is the most consistent, whoever is the best at snapping, he wins the job. I just think

03:11that reducing reps for Adam Midas is not necessarily going to be the best thing for him,

03:14and obviously it's the only way to give Wagner a real shot here, but this whole process comes down

03:18to getting enough work between the three members of the battery. And I think a competition like this

03:22really stresses how much work that you could possibly have. Again, no one really talks about

03:26long snappers or just special teams in general unless it becomes a persistent problem, and it was

03:30too big of a problem last year for the Bengals to just sit by and do nothing this offseason.

03:34But would it shock me if this competition had unintended consequences by giving reps away from Adam

03:39Minas who still may end up winning the job? It wouldn't surprise me. But like I said,

03:42we're still a week away from all this actually coming to fruition, so we'll keep it locked in

03:46to A to Z Sports Cincinnati for all your news, analysis, and updates.

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