Developing days : Carson Palmer's evolution as the Bengals' starting quarterback accelerates in training camp, where he must establish his leadership, forge a rapport with his receivers, get comfortable in the offense—and deal with enormous expectations

Sporting News, The, July 19, 2004 by Matt Crossman

This could be happening on any field in the country. One guy is running routes. Another guy is throwing footballs to him. Sometimes they connect, sometimes they don't. After one failed attempt, the thrower and the receiver huddle up. The quarterback uses one hand as a chalkboard and the index finger on his other hand as chalk, mapping out a course to run. "The ball will arrive there at the same time you do," is the apparent promise.

Separating this Norman Rockwell moment from others just like it is that this field neighbors Paul Brown Stadium, the quarterback is Carson Palmer, the first overall pick in the 2003 draft, and the receiver is Chad Johnson, a blur in tiger stripes.

There's nothing simple about taking over as starting quarterback of an NFL team. But there's nothing complicated about it, either. Take all of the talk about pressure and schemes and stunts and routes and blitzes and the speed of the game, and know that all of that is important. But not as important as this: Palmer's success in taking command of the Bengals in training camp will be based on tiny moments like his hand-diagrammed play.

Simply put, he will spend training camp learning where his receivers will be. His receivers will spend it learning where Palmer expects them to be. Of course, there are more details to learn than could fit on Palmer's palm; both elements--knowing where receivers will be and receivers being there--are described in full in a huge playbook.

For his part, Johnson promises to make Palmer's transition from potential to performance as easy as possible. Johnson is a blazing playmaker ready to make the leap from emerging star to elite player, and it likely will be Palmer's passes that carry him there. Johnson's nickname is "7-Eleven" "because I'm always open," he says. He waves oft questions about breaking in a new quarterback. "His job is very easy. Drop back and throw."

If it were really that simple, any meathead who could hit a moving target with a football would be a quarterback in the NFL. There's much more to being a quarterback than just throwing. Palmer will deal with numerous other factors in his first training camp as an NFL starter: working side-by-side with the man whose job he took, dealing with enormous expectations, establishing himself as a leader. And he'll throw some passes and get comfortable in an altered offense while he's at it.

The Jon Kitna factor

Jon Kitna's response to losing his job to Palmer has been so gracious and classy that Palmer hardly knows how to thank: him. It would be easy for Kitna to be angry; he played a major role in lifting the team from awful to competitive last year. Kitna played every offensive snap and was the league's comeback player of the year.

But this offseason, coach Marvin Lewis named Palmer the starter. "We've got to be able to throw the ball effectively, and I think Carson gives us the ability to push the ball down the field," Lewis says.

Rather than pout or demand his release, Kitna instead embraced the move and signed a contract extension through 2005. In private, Kitna called Palmer to offer the support of him and his family. In public, Kitna told reporters, 'Tin going to do everything I can to make sure he's as ready as possible every Sunday. I'm excited to see him play."

More than just a supporter, Kitna is Palmer's friend. They compete like brothers on and off the field. "I feel like every day I've got to outcompete Ion, outdo him in every drill, be faster than him, be quicker on my reads, throw better balls," Palmer says. "If it's not like that, you get lackadaisical about it, and you don't improve."

There's more at stake than the starting quarterback position. Whoever throws the first ball that hits the ground has to pay for the next round of golf. (The two compete on the golf course, too, though Kitna is so much better he gives Palmer eight strokes per round. Explains Palmer: "I always say: His advantage is he's been in the league eight years, and he should be good at golf. This is only my second") There also is the trash-can accuracy contest, the loser of which is on the hook for breakfast the next day.

The pressure factor

Though the Bengals missed the playoffs last year after losing their last two games and finishing 8-8, there's a buzz about the team that's as thick as the humidity coming off the Ohio River. For the first seven days after the team's ticket packages went on sale, the phone lines at Paul Brown Stadium were so busy that they essentially shut down. Lines of fans hungry for a winner snaked around the stadium. First-day ticket package sales surpassed the total ticket package sales for 2002 and were 10 times the first-day sales last year. The season still is two months away, but if fans want to attend any of the first four home games, they'll have to buy season tickets. Cincinnati is as excited about the Bengals as it was when Ickey Woods shuffled his way into America's short-term memory.

With that excitement has come higher expectations and, it would seem, more pressure. But Lewis and Palmer say there's so much pressure on every team every season that more doesn't mean much. It's like failing off the Chrysler Building instead of the Empire State Building--either way, you just hope to land on Regis Philbin.