AMPHAR

Free Agency is basically 2 days of hot activity then slows down afterward the following weeks. Then every team goes into a hole focusing on the draft. 1. Reader. That's a summertime deal. Its unlikely any team swoops in and signs him up given the injury. Maybe bengals can get him short term deal in the summer as his recovery timeline is more known. I think they need to focus on adding youth to D-line via draft. 2. Higgins. Tag. Takes him off the market in the rush period. Prevent WR needy teams from crossing that off their list. Maybe they can get a big deal done, maybe not. If it comes to trade at least they may control his landing spot. What you do not want to happen is to have some AFC WR needy team sign him first hours of FA. Disaster, IMO. 3. Boyd - Walk. He's probably going to get more than Bengals want to pay. Replacements may already be here. Also dependent on Tee Higgins. Chase will also get paid. 4. TE. I'd resign Irv, Sample and Hudson. Roll it back. I'd only consider major investment via draft falling that way AND if it looks like Higgins is moving on. Can only line up 11. All these dudes are cheap and they clearly settled into roles in the offense. I assume the Bengals will offer them at minor increases and replace accordingly. 5. Jonah Williams - This is the classic 2 for 1 Tobin deal. Williams will sign in a range of 12-18m of cap room. Tobin will sign 2 vet FAs for that combined room. I just think he'll be too expensive for the Bengals. Hopefully they'll have the same amount of success as in the past. 6. Chido - Not sure if they'll resign him but they'll need to find a decent replacement. Literally can't have a weak spot in CBs spots 1-4 now a days. The "Mixon" crowd. Get over it. He's not the problem with the run game. The line and really team identity is the problem with run game IF they even see it as a problem at all. I don't really think they do. Mixon is lined up a good cap price. Only look to replace if the draft board falls. Dust settles then get a Chase extension done. If they so happen to get Higgins and Chase locked up long term that's one of the best offseasons.

Zac probably needs to bite the bullet and admit club med attitude during practice only goes so far. The Bengals look soft run blocking and soft run defense. Quit worrying about the injury boggie man and put the pads on a little more during August and throughout the season. Tackling and tackling pursuit angles were horrible this year. During these all-22 reviews that seemed to pop up a bunch. There were a lot of protection scheme break downs you wouldn't expect with the vets they have along the line. At times it seems like the Bengals are the worse team still in dealing with looping End and DT stunts. Even late in the season they aren't getting those handled correctly. Bengals front office seem pretty good at identifying talent so its hard to believe its a "talent" issue across the board. To me it just sounds like a lot of "not enough" practice reps crap.

That's actually not a bad list of possible "key" FAs considering $70m in cap room.

DJ can walk. Boyd can walk. Higgins - Tag. Hopefully long term deal, should listen to trades. Chido - Walk Williams - probably should try to re-sign but not a the price he'll get, walk. Jake Browning - Exclusive rights obvious keep. Irv Smith - walk I think they need some youth and freak athletes along the D-line. Would be great to have a versatile d-line defender that raise hell at DT/DE. That's the biggest area needed to battle both Cleveland and Baltimore. It will also help you against mobile QB in Buffalo and KC. How big you invest at TE depends on what happens with Higgins. CB and Secondary - just a position group that will always need to be added to.

Maybe Mike Brown ate yo baby! Bengals have a FA acquisition battling for NFL sack lead but yeah they'll probably sit on their hands and do nothing.

They didn't have a losing record either in 2022. They also beat a AFC North rival in the playoffs. Zac Taylor was 2-10 in his start vs. AFC North. Knowing he's won the division twice. Won playoff games. Since those season, does that record really concern you today? Are you waking up at night knowing Ryan Finley sucked so bad it cost them a chance beating the Steelers at home in 2019? I'm not. Then Zac is 0-5 this year. 0-2 is largely effected by Burrow's play which was incredibly bad due to practice time lost due to his injured calf. Then when you have 16 quarters of AFC North football left to play when Burrow was throwing up 100 ratings. Zac Taylor gets 2 quarters of that. I'm not concerned at all what happened post Joe Burrow injury. I'm actually encouraged because the team got itself back into the playoff race. The AFC North win/loss record is wasted blabbering. It means nothing to the Bengals. Nobody in the real world is basing anything off a slanted data point. While it sucks missing the playoffs. It was a heck of coaching job getting through the first part of the season with bad QB play and then late in the season with an undrafted cut several times QB. I

Yeah I have a little concern the Bengals overall will not be trying to put the best team on paper to win the Superbowl. I'm not sure what Hoosier was trying to state.

I'm pretty sure the Bengals won the division in 2021 and 2022.

I think this just proves no matter what changes the Bengals make. IF they don't make the playoffs they've actually done nothing since 1991. Either way trying to fix a problem based on Zac's overall record vs. AFC North seems like a colossal waste of time. There's no magic pill. If you have AFC North teams in Weeks 1 or 2, hope your QB can get some snaps and you might want to practice a little more. Don't try to play the AFC North teams with your 2019 roster.

I don't know about expectations. I think the AFC North record overall is pointless in regards to offseason plans. The results are different when a healthy franchise QB plays. That's a fact. So if you are dead set on using the overall AFC North record and dead set on making it a problem. How do you determine the source of the problem and solutions without factoring the effect of Joe Burrow? Should they alter their draft board? Fire a coach or coaches? Change overall scheme of defense/offense? Seems kinda drastic considering everyone saw the reality of Joe's calf injury week 1. Then saddled with 4 AFC North games post bye week and got to play 2 quarters with Burrow in those 4 games. The fact Zac went 2-10 vs. the AFC north with Dalton or whoever means little to me. Might mean a bunch to somebody, I dunno.

Tag Higgins. At the very least you can control when and most importantly were he goes. Leave him unrestircted he's gone in the first few hours of FA and it could be to some AFC contender. Tagging Lamar Jackson drove down his demands and got a deal for the Ravens. But if they didn't, they at least would have been able to ship out of division/conference.

Overblown. Does Zac's 2-10 start vs. the AFC North from 2019/2020 really matter today? I'd say no considering he's won it twice since then. Does the 0-5 record today from this season matter knowing a healthy Burrow took snaps for less than 2 quarters? I'd say no. 50% of those 29 games doesn't include the reality we expect for 2024 and beyond. A healthy Joe Burrow. Its only a problem if you are thinking the Bengals will be stuck playing the AFC North without a healthy Burrow. Zac Taylor 7-5 AFC North games with a healthy Joe Burrow. He's 2-15 without. Then he's also 1-0 vs. AFC North in the playoffs.

You simply tag Higgins if you want to keep him for next year.

Division struggles are overblown, IMO. The Burrow situation effected every division game. Of course the division will be competitive once again, but the biggest need there is to have a healthy QB1.

Bengals are projected ($70m) under in cap which leads the north. They probably have the least signed but are still in the most advantageous cap situation. Of course they have several key positions to keep or fill via FA. J'mar Chase in the Summer like Burrow will be the biggest thing to watch this offseason, IMO. He's due to make $16.3m for the next 2 seasons but could easily top $50m with an extension. His agent should be in the ear of the Bengals and the Bengals should be receptive of an extension. It would be client neglect to let him play out these next two years under his rookie deal. An extension for Chase would not eat up much more Cap (pending structure) he counts $9.8 already for 2024. Baltimore projected ($11m) under - they have several key Free Agents like the Bengals to deal with. Pittsburgh $6m - over. Cleveland $12m - over. Obviously Pitt and Clev have some work to do.

Zac needs to get his team better prepared out of August into September. Especially in years with division games in the first two weeks. However, he isn't and shouldn't catch any heat. He had healthy Joe B. for less than 2 full quarters in division play. Ravens weren't winning the North with Lamar on the sidelines previous years. Ravens smartly resisted emotional fan out crys wanting Lamar or Harbaugh gone. There's been 3 coaches win the Central/North more than twice in a row. Knoll, Cowher, Marty. 2 HOFers and Marty is the only Head Coach with 200+ wins not in HOF. The AFC North has avoided cycles like the other divisions. It sucks, but the teams are good. All Zac did was take a bad situation and got everyone's hopes up. I think its an incredible job extending playoff hopes post Burrow injury. No way they are winless in the AFC North with Full Strength Burrow. Steelers can't fire Tomlin soon enough. I rather see them try to find a 4th straight 140+ game winner Head Coach. Odds are they hopefully won't find HOF QBs and Coaches as easily.

Burrow is going to want to throw the ball. Offensive staff is just going to have to make it a point not to allow an entire season go bye without some sort of balance. Burrow simply can't sustain the hits/pressure that come with the style we've seen. He was mic'd up at somepoint in 2022. Chatting with a ref. Those players when mic'd up are very aware of what they are saying, IMO. He let it be known during the Titans playoff game, the communications went out and he called the final drive, which he loved. I'm sure Burrow feels he can't beat any defense at anytime throwing the ball.

He had 2 for 18 yards vs. Vikes. Sorry, I was reading Irv Smith not Irwin.

The D-line has not been good against the run for most of the year. How much worse that gets without Reader is anybodies guess. The Bengals really need a top notch run blocking effort from their Offensive line this game to protect the Defense from Pittsburgh running the ball.

He had a couple catches.

Its not worth the effort to try to figure out. When there is a multi team scrum there are tie breaker steps that involve division standing but the steps revert back to other sets of rules once a team is eliminated from the tie. So with 4 teams tied for 2 spots there must be some elimination order procedure that puts Cincy in over Houston. However, it is unlikely these same four 4 teams will be tied AND finish in the same order in their respective division at the end of the season as they are today. The Bengals will be in with 11 wins. Entering week 18 with 10 they could have a decision on resting starters. The NFL arranges schedules to make that tougher to do. Entering week 18 with 9 wins and you'll need help with a loss is my guess. Entering week 18 with 8 wins there might be some long shot playoff possibility with a loss, and some better chances with a win. Jay Morrison above is taking liberties with "needing help" these games have been played yet. That's all. Back in my day we didn't have no fancy computer to easily project scenarios, so we waited until the last week to figure out what was "must win" and who needed help. Probably the best way to do it.

This is what I think going into the last week: 7 wins - out. Sure there may be some scenario in which a 8-9 Bengals could make it at this point with 4 games to play. I don't know and don't care to fool with those scenarios at this point. Not worth considering unless they get to last week and that scenario still exists which is doubtful. By the time last week rolls out, just 7 wins and could be already eliminated. 8 wins - high probability they are out but would have some plausible long shots to get in with a 9th win and help. 9 wins - probably in with a win. Control own destiny. Maybe a scenario holds in which 10 wins and they lose a tie breaker. Not worth worrying about at this point as there a plenty of games to shake out. 10 wins - In. Maybe scenario to rest starters. Doubt very little they would be out with an 11th win. Doubt they would be out having already recorded a 10th win. Certainly not worth considering any scenario in which they don't make it in with 11 wins/10 wins at this point. If you see them only having 8/9 wins entering the last week then that's when you can start praying for help. All other scenarios aren't scenarios they are just stories that will end once a couple weeks get played.

11 wins? - Bengals in the playoffs, mark it down and save for later. Entering last week with 10 wins? I would say there could be a chance for resting starters. I would say in the playoffs for sure even if the 11th win doesn't occur. Its only if you believe they'll enter last week with 8 or 9 wins in which you should worry about needing help for playoffs, IMO. At this point people in the playoff predictors at letting emotions take control, confusing games yet to be played as "needing help". BEFORE the Baltimore game, a lot of people were chirping the season was over IF they lost and landed 5-5. Heck they even dropped to 5-6 and they are right in the thick of a playoff hunt after 2 wins. Now people may not believe they'll land on 11 or 10 wins, but that's different. A basic playoff predictor scenario has them as 5 seed with 11. I'm sure there's a combo of button pushing that could be done to show them out with 11 wins but not worth worrying about at this point. They go into last week with 10 wins and there could be talk of resting starters.

Bengals have been good against back up QBs. Someone ran stats going back to 2010 showing the QBs had a cumulative bad passer rating or something. Fans tend to remember the Mike Whites or TJ Yates because they are thinking "easy" victory prior to the game. Fans don't have a bad memory burned into their head when the Bengals win while making a back up look like a back up. I'm not sure what 2010 really has to do with this group. Dax, Battle, etc. were probably in grade school. I just hope Lou doesn't stay in zone if the back up QB shows a comfort vs. his zone defenses. I also hope the Bengals offense can put scoring pressure on the opposing offense so they can't just play for punts in a close game.

Bengals should just run the offense from the games they win, lol. The Bengals have 3 of the 4 top 10 yardage defenses coming up, the 4th being Pittsburgh. Jake looked like a deer in headlights vs. Pittsburgh. A great coaching job to get him playing the way he has the last 2 games. To produce enough offense to qualify for playoffs they'll probably need another adjustment or two from the past couple games. The screen success of the Bengals was produced with motion forcing the Colts to show they are in zone. Then deep routes paired with play action to get their LBs to run off into zone coverage once reading pass and throw the screen underneath with an aggressive pass rush. They attempted one late game and the D-line guy got the memo and didn't rush. What happens when the defense shows man and you have that screen called? Joe Burrow would have had multiple plays to check into. Will Jake? That's the next hurdle, I guess. Roll up nearly 400 yards/30 points the next 4 weeks. Bengals could be rolling into a QB controversy next year, lol. That would be impressive QBing. I think the Bengals will need a couple shut down defensive performances next 4 weeks to make playoffs.