CINCINNATI – Former Cincinnati Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis will be in team owner Mike Brown’s corner office today at Paycor Stadium.
But the two won’t be discussing any sort of new role with the team.
Lewis is happy with the job he has.
The winningest coach in franchise history flew to Cincinnati on Thursday so he could catch up with Brown and other members of the organization he worked alongside for 16 seasons.
Then Lewis will be back at Paycor on Sunday as the color commentator for SportsUSA radio broadcast of the Bengals’ game against the New England Patriots.
It will be the second Bengals game Lewis has called in his first season on the job, with last month at Green Bay was the first.
“I’ve really enjoyed it,” the 67-year-old Lewis said. “Not just calling the action, but all of the preparation that goes into it, watching all the film of both teams and reading and listening to the comments made the coaches.
“Sometimes the night before the game it’s hard to get to sleep because you’re so excited for it.”
Lewis, 67, began his broadcast career in 2019 calling games for the fledgling Alliance of American Football.
After one season, he went back into coaching as co-defensive coordinator at Arizona State with good friend Herm Edwards.
Last year Lewis was assistant head coach to Antonio Pierce with the Las Vegas Raiders, but owner Marc Davis fired the staff after the season, leaving Lewis looking for another path.
He joined SportsUSA in the summer and called one preseason game before taking a few weeks off due to a prior engagement. He returned to the booth the week before the Bengals-Packers game.
That afternoon he spent some time chatting with Brown and other members of the front office on the field before the game.
They’ll have much more time to catch up today, when Lewis makes his third trip back to Paycor Stadium.
He flew in for Chad Johnson’s Ring of Honor induction in 2023, and he was on the visitor sideline last year when the Raiders played the Bengals in Week 9.
Lewis and Brown have remained close since they parted ways following the 2018 season, ushering in the Zac Taylor era.
They spoke every morning for 15 years.
Now it’s once every couple of months, but the love and respect are still deep.
Asked whether he will simply grab a seat in Brown’s office for a couple of hours this weekend or perhaps go off site to grab lunch somewhere, Lewis laughed.
“Mike doesn’t leave that building for anything,” he said. “People don’t know how much that man cares. Some people say he doesn’t care. Bulls—t. That’s all he cares about.”
One of the parallels between Lewis’ former job working for Brown and his current one behind the microphone is the Monday routine.
As a coach, Lewis would pour over game film for hours, looking for mistakes to correct.
As a broadcaster, it’s no different.
He asked his producer to send him a copy of broadcast each week, and that’s what he listens to when he’s working out each morning.
“I’m trying to eliminate the “you knows” and “and so forths,’” Lewis said. “I was saying “yeah” a lot instead of “yes.” Just things like that.
“When I first started doing it, they laughed and asked, ‘You really want to listen to yourself?’” he added. “I told them, ‘Yes. Doesn’t everybody want to get better?’”