Quest to Madden 16 Perfection: 49ers vs. Bengals, Week 15

After the mess that was Cleveland, I fully intended to devote another few hours of my life each day this week in an attempt to get lucky against the Bengals. What I got was a team that even Madden couldn't play or cheat with right.

The Bengals come into our franchise at 4-9, a far cry from their record in real life. While I saw they were sucking the big one in this, I was still skeptical that I could blaze through them this week. While I didn't have NEAR the problems I had against Cleveland, Madden sure tried to hand me a loss. Well for three attempts.

Attempt 1:

The 49ers received and I began working things down the field. Unfortunately, on a stupid playcall, I wound up getting sacked and taken out of field goal range. From there, Jeremy Hill did that stupid move running backs make of juking around the entire line and getting 30 yards untouched.  It also hurt when my defenders again just danced around Andy Dalton with their backs turned while he hung still in the pocket. Needless to say, they went up 7-0 rather quickly.

Then Navarro Bowman tore his groin.

There is no way I'm going to finish this when my best linebacker is down, especially with my love of calling blitzes with that very same ‘linebacker of middle.'  Reset.

Attempt 2:

I really don't know how to describe this one. There really aren't any screenshots to show how bad it is and do it justice. Basically I was limited to a 3 and out and an interception which came out of nowhere. From there, I went for it on 4^th down on the San Francisco 30 out of my own impatience and wound up 14-0 again.

Attempt 3:

The Madden rubber band broke down and after receiving the kickoff, I managed a touchdown on my first possession. The Bengals on the other hand, managed to do this about three plays in:

Yep, it's another 1 handed impossible catch (unless it's Odell Beckham Jr.) . How this catch happened I may never know. Luckily, that was the last time the Bengals would score. From there I ran the clock into the last 30 seconds in the half, capping it off with a Jarryd Hayne touchdown (anyone remember him?).

The Bengals received in the second half and Andy Dalton threw a pick six within 3 plays. I'm guessing Madden really didn't expect Andy Dalton to be as competent as he has been this year.

From there, the Bengals were stopped around the 40 yard line, and using a drive composed entirely of running, I was able to run the clock down to the final seconds and steal a win. It only took me 3 tries, and I feel a helluva lot better having not spent 10 hours trying to beat a single team.

Final Thoughts:

Hard to access the Bengals here. Andy Dalton was absolutely horrible, and considering we aren't even facing him on Sunday, not much to take on the O. On the defensive side of things, the Bengals seemed to really struggle against my many runs. I got lucky on the successful pass plays I did run,  but the secondary was holding up for the most part. Again, I don't think there is much we can take in the way of this game.

Let's see how the simulation turns out later today.