Cincinnati ? Just when the NFL’s worst team thinks it has hit bottom, another indignity comes along. The Cincinnati Bengals are underdogs to an expansion team.

Worse, they’ve given the Houston Texans more than enough motivation to make the oddsmakers look good and the Bengals look foolish.

The Texans (2-5) are favored to win Sunday in Houston, the first time they’ve gone into a game expected to win.

“It is nice to get respect as far as that goes,” Texans quarterback David Carr said.

The Texans aren’t getting a whole lot of respect from the Bengals (0-7), who have guaranteed a win Sunday even though they’ve been much less successful.

The NFL’s worst team during the last 12 years wasn’t surprised that oddsmakers are going with a team that has existed for just seven games.

“Should they show us any respect with what we’ve done this season?” receiver Chad Johnson said Wednesday. “Until we turn it around and gain our respect back, that’s what they’re going to do to us.”

The Bengals have already made it harder for them to win a game that will either mark a turning point or the low point in a season that has already made them a laughingstock.

Brandon Bennett shows his frustration during Cincinnati's loss to Tennessee last Sunday. Several Bengals, including coach Dick LeBeau, have guaranteed a win Sunday against Houston.

Following a 30-24 loss to Tennessee on Sunday, coach Dick LeBeau predicted a win in Houston. Johnson went even further, guaranteeing a victory.

Carr laughed when asked whether the Texans have bulletin boards in their new stadium and whether they are full of Bengals’ prognostications.

“We have a couple,” he said. “There are some comments. Actually, they’re plastered all over the entire stadium in bright, yellow signs. I know there’s a lot of them.”

Carr wouldn’t say exactly what was on the signs, but it’s not hard to read between the lines. The Bengals’ comments have given the Texans plenty of motivation to thump the NFL’s only winless team.

“We don’t get a lot of respect being an expansion team, so we’re used to that,” Carr said. “I think they’re a team that might be searching for something, and they thought that might be a way to get their team fired up.”

It’s hard to say what the Bengals were thinking when they made their brash predictions. LeBeau and Johnson have had several chances to back off their statements, but won’t soften them much.

Johnson didn’t back off his guarantee at all. He’s not surprised it has created such a stir.

“That’s what it should cause,” Johnson said. “I was trying to fire the team up a little bit. When our players hear the feedback, they know how I feel.”