After Thursday Night Football, before the rest of the Week 10 slate on Sunday and Monday, Joe Burrow leads the NFL in completions (246), attempts (358), passing yards (2,672), and touchdowns (24). Ja’Marr Chase leads the NFL in receptions (68), yards (981), and touchdowns (10).
The Cincinnati Bengals are 4-6.
The team is 4-1 against bad teams and 0-5 against good teams.
After yet another implosion, something has to give in Cincinnati.
Something Has to Give with the Cincinnati Bengals
The team has obvious weaknesses. These weaknesses have been known for weeks and yet, the only move the team made to try and go for it was trading a seventh-round pick for a backup running back. That running back was active for Thursday Night Football. He logged two snaps and one of them was a fumble off a botched handoff.
There were half of a dozen pass rushers rumored to be on the trade block and the Bengals failed to acquire a single one. Against Lamar Jackson, perhaps this year’s MVP, the pass rush was non-existent. The unit managed just one hit on Jackson and rarely pressured him.
In comparison, the Baltimore Ravens pressured Burrow on 40 dropbacks…out of 60.
The front office is failing. It is wasting an MVP season from Burrow and an Offensive Player of the Year season out of Chase.
Technically, the Bengals do not have a General Manager. The de-facto GM has been Duke Tobin since 1999. On the official Bengals Front Office page, the team has a Scouting Director for college (Mike Potts), a Scouting Director for the NFL (Steven Radicivic), and two individuals with “scout” and their job title. For reference, the back-to-back defending Super Bowl champions and currently undefeated Kansas City Chiefs have 14 individuals on its Front Office staff with “scout” in their job title.
Maybe having more people scouting college and NFL talent is a good thing. Who knows!?
The Bengals need to modernize in the front office. Could the lack of scouts be the reason why the team keeps whiffing on draft picks? Burrow and Chase were home runs. They would succeed for any franchise. They are making the Bengals, not the other way around.
Cincinnati won’t fire Tobin. They won’t modernize. But they should.
Beating a Dead Horse
The target of fans’ ire ever since the disappointing 2022 season has been head coach Zac Taylor. Taylor is the third coach to take his team to the Super Bowl. Forrest Gregg did so in 1981 and after the 1983 season, he left to coach the Green Bay Packers. Sam Wyche took over and led the team to the Super Bowl in 1988. He was fired three seasons later after a 3-13 campaign and one playoff appearance that ended in the AFC Divisional Round (1990).
The team will not fire Taylor. Not this year, and, barring a nuclear implosion in 2025, not next year.
A move the team should make, however, is to move on from Lou Anarumo. At this point, it is looking like the 2021 and 2022 Bengals defenses were flukes and the 2019, 2020, 2023, and 2024 units are more indicative.
Against offenses with pulses, the Bengals’ defense has been atrocious. It allowed over 300 yards of offense seven times in 10 weeks with a season-high of 520 allowed to the Baltimore Ravens in Week 5. The defense has allowed 30+ points five times and that Week 5 Ravens loss featured 41 points allowed.
Tackling has been an issue. Getting off the field has been an issue. It has forced more than five punts in a game once. In the loss to the Washington Commanders, it did not force a single punt. On Thursday Night, it forced five…but only one was in the second half on the first possession…and then it allowed four consecutive touchdowns on four drives.
The defense has been toothless against any offense not quarterbacked by a guy who won’t be there (or shouldn’t be there in Deshaun Watson‘s case) in 2025.
Of course, the front office making the conscious decision to not bring back Jessie Bates and/or DJ Reader, plus never going out and getting a top-end defender, has given Anarumo nothing to work with. If that’s the excuse, then the Bengals’ Front Office will eat the blame. But they won’t. If anything will happen, Anarumo will be let go after the season.
Silver Linings and Reasons for Optimism
The likelihood that the Bengals make any kind of move in-season is slim. If anything, it’ll happen in January if the team is eliminated from playoff contention.
At the same time, the schedule is incredibly favorable.
Seven games remain:
- at Los Angeles Chargers (SNF)
- BYE
- vs. Pittsburgh Steelers
- at Dallas Cowboys (MNF)
- at Tennessee Titans
- vs. Cleveland Browns (TNF)
- vs. Denver Broncos
- at Pittsburgh Steelers
The best scoring offense left on the schedule belongs to the Steelers (13th in the NFL). The other five opponents are in the bottom 13. In terms of total offense, every team is 15th (Cowboys) or worse. Every team except for the Cowboys (fourth…with Dak Prescott, who is now injured) is bottom 10 (with five games against the bottom seven) in passing offense.
The Bengals’ defense has played well against bad teams. There may be a legitimate path to the playoffs if they win seven in a row. Sweeping the Steelers, no matter what they look like, is difficult.
Burrow and Chase are good enough to overcome about 99% of the defense’s inadequacies. Will that be enough to get the team back to the playoffs this year?
If not, the team needs to re-evaluate and make some sweeping changes. From the top down.
Main Image: Albert Cesare/The Enquirer / USA TODAY NETWORK
