Turns out that drop-your-jaw halftime show was nothing but a soon-to-be-eclipsed warm-up act.

During the intermission of the Cincinnati Bengals’ game against the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday at Paul Brown Stadium, a flashy duo called Quick Change put on a show on a makeshift stage set up in the middle of the field.

The man and woman – sleight-of-hand tricksters, illusionists, magicians, whatever you call these popular, sports-events performers – changed their elaborate costumes in the blink of an eye time after time after time until the sold-out crowd was left with just one thought:

“I can’t believe what I’m seeing. How did that happen?”

Yet, that was nothing compared to the unfathomable moments they soon would get courtesy of A.J. Green’s hands.

The Bengals sure-mitted receiver — in the words of teammate Andrew Hawkins, “The best receiver in the NFL” — dropped two crucial third down passes in the third quarter. One was two strides from the end zone and would have been a touchdown, and the other — on Cincinnati’s very next possession — was deep in Cowboys’ territory and would have kept another touchdown drive alive.

Instead, the Bengals had to settle for a pair of field goals by new kicker Josh Brown.

Cincinnati ended up blowing a nine-point lead in the fourth and lost, 20-19, thanks to a last-second Cowboys’ field goal from 40 yards.

The defeat dropped the Bengals to 7-6 and kept them from gaining any ground on the other teams they are battling with for a wild card berth in the playoffs.

Yet, this is not to say the loss was Green’s fault.

Not when you have other receivers dropping passes, a quarterback taking an unnecessary sack, costly penalties and missed tackles on defense.

But all those miscues are not as surprising as a pair of A.J. Green drops. Those are like watching Superman unable to fly or Michael Jackson unable to dance.

“He just doesn’t drop balls — not even in practice,” Bengals rookie receiver Marvin Jones said of Green.

If you’ve watched the Bengals this season or last — when the rookie Green won Pro Bowl honors — you’ve seen him make leaping catches over two and three defensive backs, one-hand catches, diving catches, catches that won games, catches that won rival defenders’ praise when he hung on even though he had been upended in a violent collision.

And as good as Green is on the field, he showed himself to be just as solid after the game Sunday when he faced another assault.

As the post-game media descended upon him, he didn’t try to duck into the training room or make excuses or become verbally combative as some other high-profile Bengals receivers have done in similar situations in past years.

“I had two crucial drops,” Green said. “That first one, no one was in front of me and I just took my eye off it at the last second and it bounced off my hands.”

Although he had to reach down on that second miss, he said: “I make that catch nine out of 10 times, and I should have made this one. Instead it went off my shoulder pads. To be truthful, it did surprise me. I pride myself in being the best, in catching anything that touches my hands.”

“I’ve got to make those plays in critical situations because I’m the go-to guy on offense. As I go, the team goes. I lead by example, and I can’t have critical drops. I had the opportunity to make plays and I didn’t. I feel I changed the momentum.

“I take the blame for all of this.”

Around the dressing room — when other players heard Green was shouldering the load for the team’s fade — they all stood up for him.

“This game wasn’t his fault by any means — none!” Hawkins said adamantly. “We all made mistakes. We all needed to step up and make plays.

“C’mon man, A.J. Green is the best player in this dressing room. Do you realize how many games we’ve won on the back of an A.J. Green catch? He expects to make every play and when he doesn’t , he beats himself up. That’s what makes him so great. He’s a perfectionist. He’s a competitor. He’s a guy who’s going to win us a lot of games down the road.”

Left tackle Andrew Whitworth looked across the dressing room at Green — who was sitting by himself, still in uniform long after the media horde had left — and he knew what Green was facing:

“As many plays as that kid has made to win games for us, we know the kind of competitor he is.”

As a left tackle — in charge of protecting quarterback Andy Dalton’s blind side — Whitworth knows what it’s like to be under the microscope: “It’s the nature of the game. You get beat one time out of 80 plays and 320 plays later people still critique you on it.

“That’s how it is in the NFL. When you’re great, people expect it all the time and then everybody overreacts when one little thing happens.”

Although Green said, “I’m not going to beat myself up on this,” he admitted that might be hard:

“The best thing is that we play again Thursday (at Philadelphia), so I can get the bad taste out of my mouth pretty quickly.”

Hawkins saw it the same way.

“Look, today we shot ourselves in the foot. We all made mistakes: Dropped passes, turnovers, penalties, but we have a short week and we can change all that.

“Sure, what happened today is bad because all the teams we’re competing with for that playoff spot lost, too, and we could have taken a little better control of the situation. But then it’s also good because they all lost — so we didn’t lose ground.

“The bottom line is that we’re still in control of our destiny … We just have to grab hold of it.”

And then hang on.