bengals Dalton ill but will play

Associated Press

CINCINNATI

Rookie quarterback Andy Dalton missed practice on Wednesday with the flu, leaving backup Bruce Gradkowski to run the Bengals offense during another sub-freezing workout at Paul Brown Stadium.

Coach Marvin Lewis said Dalton should be back today. He’s expected to play Saturday at Houston’s Reliant Stadium, where he’s never lost. The second-round pick grew up in the suburbs and played two games there in high school and another for TCU.

The Bengals (9-7) will be trying to get their first playoff win since the 1990 season when they play the Texans. Reliant Stadium has a retractable roof, so weather won’t be an issue. The challenge is to stay healthy until then.

The temperature was 22 with a wind chill of 14 degrees when they hit the field on Tuesday. On Tuesday night, rookie receiver A.J. Green from Georgia tweeted: “It was so cold at practice today ... I couldn’t feel my toes.”

Not a whole lot better on Wednesday, with a temperature of 35 degrees and a wind chill of 27 when practice ended. Players wore hoods under their helmets to try to stay warm.

Asked if it was the coldest weather he’d ever had for practice, Green said, “Oh yeah, definitely, by far. By far.”

The Bengals are the only northern team without their own covered practice field either in use or under construction. They have the right under their stadium lease to cover one of their adjacent practice fields, but would have to pay for it.

The University of Cincinnati approached the NFL team about jointly building a bubble-covered field when Brian Kelly was football coach, but the Bengals declined. The university then built a practice field with a removable bubble on campus. The Bengals could rent the bubble for four hours at a standard rate of $2,500, but decided against it.

Dalton grew up in the Houston suburb of Katy and attended games at Reliant as a fan. He won those three games there as well, making it feel like home.

“You get a chance to play in Reliant Stadium as a high school kid, it’s a really cool thing,” Dalton said on Tuesday. “That’s how Texas high school [football] is. You get to play in NFL stadiums.”

For the first time since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970, a playoff game will feature two rookie quarterbacks. T.J. Yates, a fifth-round pick, took over after Matt Schaub and Matt Leinart got hurt and led the Texans to the playoffs.