Dave Lapham says he still can’t “wrap my mind around it.” At half-time of Sunday’s Bengals-Jets game at Paycor Stadium, the lineman-turned-radio analyst, along with defensive back Lemar Parish, will become the 11th and 12th players inducted into the Bengals Ring of Honor.
“It’s an incredible honor. I’m totally humbled by it,” says Lapham, 73. “There are so many deserving guys who should be honored by the Ring of Honor, and I’ve been chosen to be one of them. But I’m more than grateful to accept it.”
Lapham knows just how deserving all those other Bengals stars are. In his 50 years with the team — 10 as a player and 40 in the radio booth — he knows them all personally. He played with Anthony Munoz, Ken Anderson, Boomer Esiason, Ken Riley, Isaac Curtis, Tim Krumrie, Bob Johnson, and Parish.
And for years he roomed with Anderson, the quarterback who led the Bengals to the 1982 Super Bowl.
The Massachusetts native was drafted twice by Bengals founder Paul Brown. After his senior year at Syracuse University, the Bengals took Lapham in the third round (61st overall) of the 1974 NFL draft. In 1986, the Bengals owner drafted him for the radio booth.
The Bengals call Lapham arguably the most versatile offensive lineman to ever wear a Bengals uniform. He played all five offensive line positions, including all five in one game — three times! He has called himself “the interchangeable drill bit.” His teammates called him “The Tool.”
After 10 seasons with the Bengals (1974-83), and two with the old USFL New Jersey Generals (1984-85), the family moved back to Cincinnati. Lapham considered becoming a coach, but he worried about the nomadic life of a coach working at various colleges and professional franchises.
“Paul Brown brought me down to the stadium and took me into his office and said, ‘We think you’d be great to stay with the organization and be a color analyst for the radio broadcast team.’ I said, ‘Really?’ “ recalls Lapham, who earned a communications degree at Syracuse.
Lapham has called games on the Bengals radio network since 1986 with all six of the team’s announcers: Phil Samp, Ken Broo, Paul Keels, Pete Arbogast, Brad Johansen and, since 2011, with Dan Hoard.
In 2010, during his 25th season on the air, I compared him to Joe Nuxhall, the late beloved, excitable Reds radio analyst:
“He’s the Bengals' Joe Nuxhall. He’s the team’s biggest cheerleader and often their harshest critic. Fans who don’t like his enthusiasm appreciate his disappointment and honesty when things go wrong — in a game, a season, or a decade.”
And now he’s heading into the Ring of Honor.
Not bad for a Boston-area guy who couldn’t find Cincinnati on a map when he was drafted.
“I wasn’t sure where it was located in Ohio,” he says. Lapham once told me that when he flew here to meet the Bengals front office after the 1974 draft, and the pilot said, “Welcome to Northern Kentucky,” he worried he was on the wrong plane.
It didn’t take long for Dave and his wife Lynne, also from suburban Boston, to make Cincinnati home — before and after his two-year guaranteed contract with the New Jersey Generals.
“We never really considered anything else but coming back to Cincinnati when my playing days were totally over. Cincinnati was where my children were born. It’s where all of their friends were. They consider themselves Cincinnatians through and through,” he says.
Former teammate Bob Trumpy, the “godfather of Cincinnati sports talk” who hosted WLW-AM’s weeknight show (1980-90) while calling NFL games for NBC television, was very helpful launching Lapham’s broadcasting career. Lapham filled in for Trumpy on WLW-AM, and helped him get a network tryout. Lapham did at least three games for NBC in 1987.
What amazes me about Lapham’s color commentary is his uncanny knack at accurately calling a penalty before the yellow flag hits the turf. Lapham says Trumpy taught him the secret: Don’t watch the ball. Leave it to the play-by-play announcer to describe where the ball goes. The analyst’s job is to explain why the play did or didn’t work.
“I watch the line of scrimmage from the middle of the offensive line, and then get my eyes as wide as I can to encompass the entire formation, offensively and defensively. I look for motions, shifts, changes of strengths and try to figure out what they’re doing, and where they might try to attack,” he says.
Ironically, his success as an analyst resulted in a hectic travel schedule. For more than two decades he’d fly every fall Friday to do Big 12 games for Fox Sports Net on Saturday, then sometimes travel hours to call the Bengals game on Sunday. And that was after a Thursday night High School Game of the Week for Fox Sports Ohio on Cincinnati cable TV. Lapham lived up to his “Tool” nickname by being a versatile sportscaster. He also has done University of Cincinnati basketball games, track, and wrestling.
Those days are over, but Lapham is still as busy as ever. During football season he works six days a week for the Bengals. After the Sunday game, he does a three-hour WLW-AM show on Monday with Lance McAlister; a two-hour radio show on Wednesday, a three-hour show on Friday; plus “other media responsibilities” on Tuesday and Thursday.
“The only off day is Saturday if the Bengals are playing a home game. But if it’s a road game you’re traveling,” he says.
When his contract is up after the 2027 season, Lapham will be 75. He wants to go year-to-year and give up some of his weekday shows. That would give him more time to watch his two grandsons play youth football here in Greater Cincinnati — all because Bengals patriarch Paul Brown drafted him twice.
“I know there are a lot of people to thank, obviously, for the Ring of Honor honor. It’s incredible,” he says. “But I do know that the guy who’s the most responsible for getting into the Ring of Honor, and who laid the foundation for me, and was there every step of the way for me, and answered any question I had, was Paul Brown. And his son Mike, when he took over.
“They wanted me to remain as part of the organization, and I’ll be eternally grateful.”
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