What was life like the last time the Bengals won a playoff game?

Now is a good time to reflect on just how long it had been since the Bengals’ previous playoff win in 1991.

Before defeating the Las Vegas Raiders last Saturday, the Cincinnati Bengals’ last playoff victory was on January 6, 1991, a 41-14 thrashing of the Houston Oilers.

Just how long ago was that?

Well, most of the other Cincy Jungle writers were so young (or unborn) that I was the person asked to write this blog.

Just to give you an idea what life was like back then, the biggest event of the year was perhaps the Gulf War, which started only four days after the Bengals lost to the Los Angeles Raiders in the AFC Divisional round and ended about a month later.

The internet was only made a publicly available service later that year, in August. So most of us had to actually wait for our favorite programs to come on television (gasp) or go into a Blockbuster or other video rental store (you could get better deals at your local library, but most didn’t have the patience to wait for newer arrivals). Of course, many of us went to movie theaters back then. The holiday classic Home Alone was still doing well in theaters when the Bengals clobbered the Oilers.

If you wanted to play video games, you’d probably go to your SEGA Genesis, which was an upgrade over an NES console, which was an even bigger upgrade over the Atari 7800 (though it still seems to have maintained some of its charm):

Now if you were a good boy or good girl, you may have just received the new Super Nintendo system, which came out just in time for Christmas, or less than two months before the Bengals’ win over Houston.

Musically, most of the people I knew in the area were hard rock fans. You know that Paul Brown Stadium anthem, “Welcome to the Jungle,” by Guns N’ Roses? That was released nearly four years before that playoff win against the Oilers. Yeah. It’s old.

One of the most memorable songs released in 1991 included Bryan Adams’ “(Everything I Do) I Do It for You,” which was written for the Kevin Costner Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves movie. Janet Jackson was at the peak of her powers. And then there was this group C+C Music Factory, who somehow made us all sweat to their grooves even if we were sedentary.

Fashion was very different. No skinny jeans. In fact, lots of baggy pants, thanks to the popularity of one M.C. Hammer and his 1990 hit song “U Can’t Touch This.”

And what were we eating? Well, it certainly didn’t have kale in it. Rather, most were obsessed with avoiding fat and butter. Some of us had to tolerate this thing called “margarine” on our toast. Yuck!

Long story short, the year 1991 was so long ago that a lot of those reading this won’t remember much of what I’ve discussed. But, the important thing is, we no longer have to think about what happened 31 years ago. This is a new era, and Joe Burrow and his squad are not done yet.

We previewed the Bengals’ AFC Divisional round playoff game against the Tennessee Titans with former Titan Denard Walker:

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