Bengals fire offensive coordinator Ken Zampese after 2 games with 0 touchdowns

The Cincinnati Bengals finished the first two games of the 2017 season without a single touchdown, and that cost offensive coordinator Ken Zampese his job, the team announced Friday.

Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis was noncommittal about the possibility of changing coaching personnel after the team’s 13-9 loss to the Houston Texans on Thursday Night Football but was critical of Zampese, in particular.

Stepping into the job will be quarterbacks coach Bill Lazor.

The Bengals are the fifth team to have Lazor as a quarterbacks coach but the first to give him a job as offensive coordinator. He previously coached for Miami, Philadelphia, Washington, and Seattle. Lazor does have some coordinator experience, taking on the job during a three-year stint with the University of Virginia from 2010 to 2012.

By not scoring a touchdown Thursday, the Bengals became the first team since 1939 to start a season with two home games but zero trips to the end zone. They’re the second team in the last 10 years without a touchdown in the first two weeks, joining the 2016 Rams that finished last in points and offensive yardage.

What does this mean for the Bengals offense? Probably not much. Zampese’s replacement, Lazor, will have the unenviable task of trying to find points for a team with a poor offensive line.

Quarterback Andy Dalton is also struggling at the helm of the offense with just 54.5 percent of his passes completed through the first two weeks, along with four interceptions.

How are Bengals fans reacting to the news? It was an inevitable move in the eyes of the folks at Cincy Jungle:

“It was painfully clear in 2016 that Zampese was not the man for this job. After two games in 2017, he’s becoming a hated man in Cincinnati, and that’s sad. All he did was take a promotion that should have never been offered to him, but nonetheless was.”

What does this mean for Marvin Lewis? Now in his 15th season, Lewis has zero postseason victories and entered the year on the hot seat. It’s about as blazing hot as it can possibly get now.

The move is pretty unprecedented for the Bengals too. Zampese is the only coordinator in the team’s 50-year history to get the boot in the middle of a season.

With Zampese out, there’s nobody else to fire if things don’t get better for the Bengals soon. More losses like the one against the Texans on Thursday could mean Lewis is out of a job before 2017 ends.