The NFL’s decision to sell AFC Championship Game tickets for Buffalo Bills-Kansas City Chiefs at a neutral site before the conference title matchup was even decided clearly was not lost on the Cincinnati Bengals.
Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow dropped the mic with his “better send those refunds” comment immediately after Cincinnati eliminated Buffalo from the postseason with a 27-10 victory. Bengals coach Zac Taylor followed it up with a tough-in-cheek apology for ruining the league’s plans, which included playing a potential Bills-Chiefs title game at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.
But those two weren’t the only ones to acknowledge the oversight after Cincinnati’s road win at Highmark Stadium. Mark Slaughter, a sports producer for WLWT in Cincinnati, shared a video with three players — cornerback Mike Hilton, running back Joe Mixon and receiver Tyler Boyd — all taking shots at the league’s decision.
“We’ll see y’all in Atlanta,” Hilton said with a smirk while making quotation marks with his hands. “See y’all in Atlanta.”
Mixon added: “We’ll see y’all in the AFC Championship next week at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.”
Boyd followed up with: “Don’t nobody want to play us, man. … They gave them (Bills) home field. Neutral site. If you bought tickets, you better sell ’em.”
Cincinnati’s victory lap is well-earned.
For reference, the NFL told the Chiefs and Bills to start selling tickets for a potential neutral-site game at Mercedes-Benz Stadium before the AFC title matchup was set. The Chiefs advanced past the Jacksonville Jaguars on Saturday, but the Bills weren’t able to do the same, and thus Mercedes-Benz Stadium will not host the contest.
The neutral-site game first came into play after the Damar Hamlin injury caused the Week 17 cancellation of Bills-Bengals. Cincinnati, at the time, was the No. 3 seed in AFC and also potentially could have claimed the league’s No. 1 spot over the final two weeks but that was not taken into consideration.
Now the Bengals will look to complete their admittedly more difficult run to a second consecutive Super Bowl. The Bengals travel to Arrowhead Stadium on Sunday to face the top-seeded Chiefs.
