Defensive end Michael Johnson is back in Cincinnati after a spending a year with the Buccaneers that was filled with more failures than successes.
Johnson doesn’t think that things will play out the same way in his return to the Bengals. The results were good when Johnson last played with defensive end Carlos Dunlap and defensive tackle Geno Atkins and Johnson said the team would “get that and then some” now that he’s back on the roster.
Johnson will be wearing a different number than he wore in his first stint with the Bengals and says they’ll get an “upgraded version” of both the player that left and the defense he was part of in the past.
“We’re about to be a part of something special,” Johnson said, via ESPN.com. “When you’ve got something special, you want to try to keep it going. We’ve got it up here. I’m excited to get back and get it going again and take it to a whole new level.”
The remaining Bengals defensive linemen didn’t fare much better than Johnson last season, leaving both sides to make the bet that everything old can be good again in 2015. Anything less will leave the Bengals in need of a new strategy to get after quarterbacks and solidify a key part of their defense.
