The Cincinnati Bengals have taken four running backs in the first round of the NFL draft in their 56-year history. The results have not been pretty-in fact they’ve been downright brutal. The Bengals may try a fifth time this year after meeting With Boise State running back and Heisman runner-up Ashton Jeanty at the NFL combine. With Jeanty potentially in play for the Bengals in the first round of the 2024 NFL draft, should the Bengals try their hand one more time?

Chris Perry 2004

Chris Perry was taken with the 26th overall pick in the 2004 NFL draft by the Cincinnati Bengals. Perry rushed for over 1,600 yards and 18 touchdowns as a senior on Michigan, earning him All-American honors and the Doak Walker award for most outstanding running back in the nation. Perry’s impressive senior season also earned him the 2003 Big Ten offensive player of the year award.

Unfortunately, none of his college success translated into the NFL whatsoever. Perry only started a total of nine games out of his 35 total in his NFL career. Perry didn’t even have a rushing touchdown under his belt until 2008-the final year of his career. Perry’s career 3.4 yards per carry and 17.3 yards per game are just terrible marks for a first round running back, or any running back for that matter.

Chris Perry is the last running back the Bengals have taken in the first round. Just north of 20 years later, could the Bengals try to redeem their porous draft history of first round running backs?

Ki-Jana Carter 1995

Perhaps the most highly touted prospect on this list, Ki-Jana Carter received heaps of pre-draft praise after his historic 1500-yard and 23 touchdown 1994 season at Penn State. The hype for Carter was so high that the Bengals, yes, the Bengals actually traded up to the number one overall pick from 5th overall. Cincinnati hasn’t traded up in the first round since, and it’s not hard to see why they’d be scarred from this trade.

On just the third carry of his first preseason game, tragedy struck. Carter suffered a torn knee ligament causing him to miss his entire rookie season in 1995. Carter was never able to fully recover from his injury and after several other ailments he just was never the same. A torn rotator cuff in 1997, a broken wrist in 1998, and a dislocated kneecap in 1999 proved he just couldn’t stay healthy and was a shell of his Penn State self.

Carter only played 35 games as a Bengal, amassing just 747 rushing yards in 4 years. To make matters worse, Carter was the second of consecutive first overall picks by the Bengals from 1994-95. “Big Daddy” Dan Wilkinson also did not pan out for the Bengals. Missing on back-to-back first overall picks set a struggling franchise back even further.

To this day, Carter remains one of the biggest busts and ‘what if’s” in franchise history.

Charles Alexander 1979

Charles Alexander was taken 12th overall in the 1976 NFL Draft. The LSU product managed just one 700-yard season and never scored more than three total touchdowns in his seven-year career, all with the Bengals. Alexander was a two time All-American and the 1977 SEC player of the year, but that success never translated on the Bengals.

Archie Griffin 1976

The only two time Heisman winner in the history of college football, Archie Griffin, was selected by the Bengals 24th overall in 1976. Coming from just up the road at Ohio State, the man who made history looked to continue his storied career in stripes. However as fate would have it, the undersized back failed to do so. In his seven years in the league, all in Cincinnati, Griffin never rushed for over 700 yards and three touchdowns in a single season. Griffin ended his career averaging 28.7 yards per game. What seemed like a slam dunk picked turned into a big disappointment.

Almost a fifth

According to Detroit Lions star running back, Jahmyr Gibbs, he believes the Bengals were about to trade up for him in the 2023 NFL draft before being taken at 12th overall. Via the Richard Sherman Podcast:

“Cincinnati was gonna get me. I think they were gonna trade up at like 18 or somewhere around that range.”

It is unclear how Gibbs knew this or if it is accurate at all. If there is merit to Gibb’s claim, that would have been the first time since 1995 the Bengals traded up in the first round, and for another running back. Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer did report pre-draft that the Bengals were interested in the Alabama back. So, who knows, maybe there is some weight to this claim.

The Bengals missed on all four of their first round running backs. With Ashton Jeanty potentially staring them in the face when the Bengals go on the clock, fate may be tempted. Would Jeanty be able to break the Bengals string of bad beats, or should the Bengals stay away altogether?