When it came to free-agent pass-rusher Boye Mafe, Bengals defensive line coach Jerry Montgomery turned on the tape and turned off that maze of numbers generated by everything from Next Gen Stats to Pro Football Focus to the next guy's notebook.

"People can look at numbers all they want. The film doesn't lie. Watch the film," Montgomery says. "I think a lot of people look at all this PFF and all that stuff instead of watching the film, and he's a ready good addition. We're ecstatic to have him."

A good way to describe the guy that the Bengals lured from the edge of Seattle's Super Bowl champs to the edge Trey Hendrickson once racked up the most sacks in the NFL. Turn off the noise, and Mafe has a knack for coming through with a silent efficacy.

From using sign language to salute his late mother with every sack, to grabbing a Nigerian flag in the swirl of the confetti greeting the Super Bowl champs, to putting up numbers no matter the scheme, Mafe takes his cue from the man who accompanied him to Thursday's signing at Paycor Stadium.

Adewale Mafe, his father, who goes by Wally, left Nigeria when he was 22, and went to college in Paris and Montreal before settling in Minneapolis. From there, he and wife Bola raised six children while he ran a cleaning company, and she had one of her own making and designing clothes.

"Four girls, two boys. All professionals," Wally Mafe said. "They get that from the parents. We didn't slack off."

Boye Mafe, 27, the youngest, can tell you about that. Every morning, he saw the light. His father tells him about the darkness. But every day Boye saw the light from his dad's office.

"He's one of these people who taught you that you work in the dark, don't worry about the light," Boye Mafe said. "I'd be getting ready for school, and he'd been in his office for an hour or two. Seeing him do that every day, it makes it easier for me to say, 'All right, I've got to go to work myself."

Boye Mafe thinks about it for a second. Coming to a new country and creating a life and a business still running 37 years later ("22 employees," Wally says), and the son shakes his head.

"To this day," Boye Mafe said, "that's one of my motivations. I tell myself I can't ever complain, or be mad, or be sad. He did it without even having a chance, and he made a way. If there's a way, there's a will."

They all needed that when Bola Mafe was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer during her son's senior year of high school. Boye chose to stay home and play at the University of Minnesota.

"There was stuff happening at home, and I wanted to be close to my family," Mafe said, "and have my support circle around me."

Bola never saw him play in college, but he always makes sure she's there. After the national anthem and after a sack, he offers the American Sign Language version of "I love you."

It was also a salute to the family when he ended up waving a Nigerian flag on the field before he hoisted the Lombardi Trophy. Mafe makes sure he keeps in touch with the country where his parents were born. He went to boarding school there for a year, and now if he doesn't go back every year, it's every two years. This July is a definite because the entire family is going back to celebrate Wally's 70^th birthday.

In the Instagram posts, you can hear him say, "Naija! We're on top of the world tonight."

"Impromptu," Mafe said. "After we won, there was a guy walking around with a bunch of flags. "I said, 'Let me get that.' He said, 'You can have it.' I loved it. There's a photo of me doing an interview with it on my shoulders."

You can bet Montgomery watched the Super Bowl tape because he watches everything. That was the scheme where head coach Mike Macdonald used him 50% of the time doing a little bit of everything. But not much on third down in a year he had two sacks after getting a combined 15 the previous two seasons.

Click back two years ago, and Montgomery could see that unblocked sack against the Bengals in the Pete Carroll scheme that saw him getting nine sacks that year and playing pretty much how the Bengals are going to use him.

On all three downs.

Montgomery is also the Bengals' run game coordinator, and not only does he need pressure from Mafe, but he needs him to set the edge in what still looks to be a rough-and-tumble AFC North with a Pittsburgh guy coaching the Steelers and a defensive coordinator coaching the Ravens.

"We think he'll affect the quarterback at a high rate and be a good run player," Montgomery says. "Those three-down players add so much value to your team, and he's one of them.

"He did a lot of things for them. He's a versatile player. He can set edges. He can rush the passer. That was such a deep D-line (in Seattle), when you're able to rotate like that, you're able to keep guys fresh. We think he's a great fit for what we do."

Montgomery turned on the tape. A few minutes after Boye Mafe talked about his dad turning on the light, he met the Cincinnati media for the first time and let them know he was back in the darkness.

"You do your job because that's what you're supposed to do," his son told the microphones.