The 1993 Cincinnati Bengals season was the team's 26th year in professional football and its 24th with the National Football League. This for the first time since 1979, Anthony Muñoz was not on the opening day roster and for the first time since 1983, Boomer Esiason was not on the opening day roster. The David Klingler experiment at starting quarterback got off to a poor start, as the Bengals lost their first ten games for the second of three 0–8 starts in four seasons.
The Bengals would finally get their first win against the Los Angeles Raiders 16–10, at Riverfront Stadium, but were the last winless team for the first of two consecutive years.[1] This ignominy would not be suffered subsequently by any NFL franchise until division rivals the Cleveland Browns went 1–31 in 2016and 2017. After dropping their next two games, the Bengals closed the season by winning twice before losing their closer to a disappointing Saints outfit to finish with their second 3–13 season in three years.[2]
The late-season win over the Raiders was their first win against a team that finished with a winning record since the 1990–91 AFC Wild Card win over the Oilers (41–14, January 6, 1991). This was the only such regular-season win from 1991–1994 and would be the last such win until week 1 of 1995 (Indianapolis). The win was one of only four against teams with winning records in head coach David Shula's tenure with the team.
