The Bengals Should not Second Guess Drafting Jonah Williams

The Bengals first round draft pick will miss the entire season due to shoulder surgery. Still, Cincinnati made the right choice on night one of the draft.

Jonah Williams was the most polished offensive lineman in the draft. The plan was for the Alabama product to step in and stabilize a unit that struggled big time last year. Williams was likely the Week 1 starter at right tackle.

Those plans will have to wait until 2020. What is interesting is that in a fan poll on the Stripe Hype Twitter page the night before the draft, a slight majority of 236 Bengals fans who voted said they wanted to draft former Ohio State signal caller and eventual Washington Redskin Dwayne Haskins.

Admittedly, social media probably does not speak for an entire fan base. Still, with the Williams injury, the “should have drafted Haskins” crowd is out in full force. It is still difficult to understand for one simple reason. At the start of the offseason, if you objectively listed Cincinnati’s problems, you would have gone a long way before getting to quarterback Andy Dalton. Especially with the two linebacking Devins already off the board, Williams made the most sense as far as making an immediate impact.

The mind boggling aspect of the Williams injury is that he will be the fifth straight Bengals first round pick to miss all or part of his rookie season due to injury. A fair amount of fans are putting the strength and conditioning staff on blast. However, that aspect of the organization is also brand new this year. Their interaction with Williams was likely limited leading up to the injury.

The bottom line is this. The Bengals franchise has struggled for nearly 30 years. This is due in no small part to some bad decisions like Akili Smith on draft day, but also some bad luck like Ki-Jana Carter. At this point, it is only fair to put Williams in the bad luck box.

The good news is there is still plenty of time for Williams to make and impact in the stripes. He will no doubt be given a fair opportunity to do so when he gets healthy.