Fresno St. defensive tackle Jason Shirley was off of some teams’ draft boards. But not the Bengals, oh no. It is unfathomable that the Bengals have learned absolutely nothing about the importance of avoiding turds. Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis acknowledged Sunday night that Shirley could be a problem.

“It’s a little bit of a risk, yes,” coach Marvin Lewis said. “There’s a lot of guys who have gone over the last two days with more substantial things hanging over their heads.”

Shirley was suspended for the first two games of the season for conduct detrimental to the team.

“That was a team issue, a personal team issue with coaches and teammates. I made a bad decision and it was one of those things that I had to pay for,” Shirley said.

But why stop there when you could keep it going? He was then arrested on October 8th after he crashed his car into an apartment building. According to the Fresno Bee, he was charged with hit-and-run, driving under the influence, and driving with a blood-alcohol content of .08 percent or higher.

But is that a reason not to draft a guy? C’mon. Who hasn’t gotten wasted and turned our car into a one-man destruction machine? Easy mistake. Still, he got suspended for the season (although that was overturned after four games because medical documents said he had a concussion before the accident. Ah, a concussion. Those aren’t problems at the NFL level).

So what do you do next? Drive with a suspended license and expired tags, duh. He’s pleading not guilty to a bunch of the charges and a jury trial is pending.

“I have a court date May 21. And right now, everything’s going kind of smooth. I can’t really get into the details about it, as advised to me by my lawyer, but it’s going smooth,” Shirley said. “It’s looking real good, and hopefully I can get that expunged off my record.”

The Bengals have really gotten a jump on things. Why wait for a player to break the law when they are on the team when you can draft guys who have gotten a head start?

Photo Caption: “I SAID: I want more headroom in the shot!!”