Cleveland Browns felt Bengals disrespected them

Cleveland Browns safety Jabrill Peppers said he felt disrespected by the Cincinnati Bengals in their last meeting and it gave him some extra motivation

Before the Cleveland Browns headed to Cincinnati to play the Bengals in Week 12, there was a lot of talking — and it was coming from both sides. After the game, there was even more talking.

Most of the attention was being paid to the feud between former Cleveland head coach Hue Jackson ‚— who took a job with the Bengals after being canned — and quarterback Baker Mayfield. The young quarterback held nothing back and called Jackson fake.

While there was plenty of criticism for Mayfield for not playing nice, safety Jabrill Peppers pulled the curtain back some and gave us all a glimpse of why the Browns weren’t playing nice.

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Ahead of the game, Peppers said he felt slighted as the team asked the Browns why they felt they could talk trash, reminding them that they were the Cleveland Browns after all.

Of course, Cleveland responded with a lopsided win and Peppers said that comment gave him some motivation.

"“That was probably the most disrespectful thing somebody said to us,” Peppers said via Nate Ulrich of Ohio.com. “That’s why I think we’re going to come out here with the same type of tenacity because stuff like that, that sticks with you. Like these guys really, really don’t respect us as an organization and as players. So that makes you want to go out there with that extra oomph.”"

Peppers wasn’t the only Cleveland player fired up. Fellow safety Damarious Randall also wanted to silence Cincinnati and did so by intercepting a pass, and promptly running out of bounds and handing the ball to Hue.

Heading into their Week 16 game, the Browns will surely again use the Bengals looking down on them as motivation. And if they can defeat them, it guarantees Cincinnati will finish 2018 as the last place team in the AFC North.

Then in 2019, they can ask them why they’re talking trash when they simply play for the Bengals.