Cincinnati Bengals: 30 greatest players in franchise history

• 3x Pro Bowl w/Bengals (1986, 1988-89)
• 1x Second-Team All-Pro w/Bengals (1989)
• Cincinnati Bengals 40th Anniversary Team
• 157 games w/Bengals, 144 career starts

The excellent pro football career for guard Max Montoya almost didn’t happen. He wasn’t medically cleared to play high school football as a senior due to a heart murmur. This led the talented offensive lineman down the junior college route before winding up at UCLA.

The Bengals used a seventh-round pick on Montoya in the 1979 NFL Draft. He would play his first 11 of 16 professional seasons with the team that drafted him in the Queen City. Montoya became the Bengals’ starting right guard beginning in 1980 as a second-year player. However, he wouldn’t hit his prime as a professional until midway through his career.

Once Montoya reached his 30s, he started to become a regular in the Pro Bowl for the AFC. He earned his first Pro Bowl nod in 1986, starting at right guard in all 16 games that season. After a down year in 1987, Montoya would put together his two best seasons in Bengals uniform in 1988 and 1989.

He made his second and third career trips to the Pro Bowl, earning All-Pro second team honors in 1989. That would prove to be his last season with Cincinnati, as Montoya played his final five NFL seasons with the then Los Angeles Raiders. Montoya made his fourth and final Pro Bowl in Raiders uniform in 1993 at the age of 37. He retired the next season at the age of 38.

Montoya may get overlooked in the story of the Bengals offense. He played on the same offensive line as Pro Football Hall of Fame left tackle Anthony Muñoz, who was routinely an All-Pro first team player. Ken Anderson was still in his prime under center when Montoya was a young player. Boomer Esiason’s prime coincided with the best years Montoya played with the Bengals.

Overall, Montoya was a guy that persevered throughout his long NFL career. He was thought to be done with athletics as a teenager in high school and became a perennial Pro Bowler in the AFC well into his 30s.

Did it help that Montoya played for outstanding coaches the likes of Terry Donahue, Bill Walsh and Sam Wyche? Absolutely, but we have to remember that Montoya was more than just a glue guy on the Bengals offensive line. The Bengals were a balanced offensive attack in two completely different systems in the 1980s (pre-West Coast, no-huddle) and Montoya was very much in the middle of all that.