The Fully Rebooted Cincinnati Bengals
By: Rajan Nanavati
Tags: NFL, Sports, Cincinnati Bengals, Cincinnati, Football

Of course, no part of Cincinnati’s renovation is more significant than the change the team made at the quarterback position.

Gone is Andy Dalton — the guy who was perennially too good to replace, but not nearly good enough to where you could legitimately harbor championship aspirations. And in Dalton’s place steps Joe Burrow — the record-setting, Championship-winning passer from LSU, whom the Bengals selected with the #1 overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft.

In any other situation, the incoming rookie quarterback would have to be worried about filling the shoes of one of the most productive passers in franchise history; yet, Burrow’s top challenge will be living up to his own expectations, coming off of what he accomplished in college, and the subsequent hype as a result of those accomplishments.

The burden of hype, the weight of expectations, and the pressure associated with being the #1 overall pick is a lethal combination for any 23-year old kid being anointed the new cornerstone for a $2 billion dollar franchise. But after faring exceedingly well in an offseason drastically altered because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Burrow (officially) arrived in Cincinnati and — by multiple accounts — appears to be living up to the lofty standards which have been set for him (at least so far):

The idea of the quarterback being one of the strengths of the Cincinnati Bengals already represents a large departure from what we’ve come to associate with this team in years past.

To that end, Burrow actually finds himself in another situation that’s a rarity for quarterbacks being selected by a team coming off a dreadful season like the one Cincinnati just had: being able to lead one of the best collections of skill position players in the entire NFL.

In so many past instances, the first thing that you hear from NFL teams after they draft a franchise quarterback is: “now we have to surround him with the weapons he needs to succeed.” That task has seemingly been completed for Burrow already, considering many consider the Bengals to have one of the five best groups of wide receivers in the NFL:

AJ Green is hellbent on proving he has a few seasons left in which he can play like one of the best receivers in football.

Behind Green are Tyler Boyd, Auden Tate, and Alex Erickson — a trio who combined for 173 receptions, 2,150 yards, and 6 touchdowns last year; Boyd actually finished among the top 25 receivers in the league last year in receptions (90) and receiving yards (1,046)

And that’s not even mentioning the addition of Clemson University star receiver Tee Higgins in the 2nd round of the 2020 NFL Draft, or the potential of salvaging anything from John Ross.

The glass half-full perspective tmight be that Cincinnati’s depth at wide receiver will have to make up for the lack of any existing depth at tight end (the clock has all but run out on CJ Uzomah and the Bengals learned nothing about Drew Sample after an injury-riddled rookie season last year). Still, most NFL teams bother keeping a sixth wide receiver if he’s someone they’ll use primarily on Special Teams; the Bengals, however, are in a position where they’ll seriously consider keeping as many as seven receivers, if they need another one for kick and punt coverage.

At running back, it’s more of a quality over quantity situation for the Bengals’ offense.

There’s Joe Mixon, and then… not much else. That might seem to be cause for alarm, but in a league increasingly veering towards the running-back-by-committee approach, Mixon rarely gets the recognition he deserves for his singular productivity. He’s one of only three running backs in the NFL (along with Ezekiel Elliott and Chris Carson) to run for more than 1,100 yards in each of the past two seasons, and he’s caught at least passes in both seasons as well.

Ordinarily, it would behoove any team to be cognizant of the workload they’re giving a running back coming off a season in which he finished with 313 touches (like Mixon had in 2019), but Mixon has yet to miss a single game over the past two seasons, and in 2019, he actually got stronger as the season progressed; no running back in the NFL carried the ball more times than Mixon in the final eight games of the year, and only Derrick Henry had more yards:

Mixon’s first eight games: 101 attempts, 320 yards and 3.17 yards per attempt

Mixon’s last eight games: 177 attempts, 817 yards and 4.62 yards per attempt

Mixon has grown into arguably the offense’s — if not the team’s — most valuable player, a hard worker on and off the practice field, and an integral locker room presence. That’s a pretty remarkable statement, considering the reputation he was tagged with as a result of the unconscionable incident in which he was involved while in college. Instead, the free-agent-to-be enters the 2020 season with the goal of earning a lucrative contract extension to remain in the Queen City — something that appears to be very much in the cards for him, if he keeps up his current level of performance.

So, even if the remaining depth chart at running back behind Mixon consists of Gio Bernard (the veteran running back who is almost certainly not going to be with Cincinnati past this season) and Trayveon Williams (an interesting 5'8" jitterbug running back taken late in the 2019 NFL Draft), the Bengals are just fine at the position. Plus, the position itself has become so commoditized in today’s NFL that filling out the backup spot at this position might’ve become the easiest plug-and-play transition of any position on a football team.

If the overhauled offensive line — 3 of the 5 starters projected for opening day weren’t with the team in 2018 — can provide running lanes to Mixon and protection for Burrow, it would not be a surprise if the Bengals quickly emerge as one of the more underratedly potent offenses in the conference, if not the league.