Locked On Bengals - Daily Podcast On The Cincinnati Bengals - Week 5 Cincinnati Bengals Film Breakdown: Joe Burrow & Offense Shine, but the Defense is AWFUL!

Starting point is 00:00:00 The Cincinnati Bengals on offense are what you would expect and hope a Joe Burrow-led offense to be. Unfortunately, this is the worst defense of the Joe Burrow era. Let's break down what the film tells us. You are Locked-on Bengals, your daily Cincinnati Bengals podcast. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. What up, Bengals fans, and welcome to another episode of the Locked-on Bengals podcast. I'm your host, Jake Liscoe, along with your host, James Rupon. joined today by Mike Santagina, our weekly film guests here on Lockdown Bengals,

Starting point is 00:00:42 part of the Lockdown Podcast Network where we cover your team every day. We're on YouTube, where everywhere you get your podcast. If you're new to the show, you can subscribe. It makes it very easy to keep up with everything going on with your Cincinnati Bengals. And welcome back to the everydayers. Welcome back to those of you who make us your first listen. Looking for the film-based takeaways from the Bengals Week 5 disaster loss at home. to the Baltimore Ravens.

Starting point is 00:01:07 Today's episode is brought to you by GameTime, where you can save $20 on your first purchase of tickets with promo code locked on NFL in the GameTime app. We're going to start with some positives today. We did not spend a whole lot of time on positives after the game, hopefully understandably so. But on the offensive side of the ball, the Bengals score 38 points.

Starting point is 00:01:29 They don't get it done down the stretch. But Joe Burrow plays his best game of the season. they're pushing the ball down the field. Jamar Chase and T. Higgins looked like Jamar Chase and T. Higgins. The stars of the offense were really good. Mike, when you watched the Bengals passing offense, against the Baltimore defense it gave Joe Burrow issues the first time they played last year,

Starting point is 00:01:50 and Mike McDonald generally over the years giving Joe Burrow issues. What were your takeaways watching Joe Burrow run things against Baltimore? I mean, the biggest difference to me was they still played not to the same level, but they still tried some of those split field coverages. And Joe Burrow was very willing to push the ball down the field. If you could think of the past three games, I mean, his average depth of the target in one of those games was under four, but it was usually like five yards.

Starting point is 00:02:17 It just felt so condensed. Everything felt so tight. And even when he's operating well, like in the game before he injured his wrist, it was five yards here, eight yards here. Maybe a 10 yard is like their version of like an explosive pass play down the field. just didn't really look for those deep shots. This game, they made it a priority to push the ball down the field,

Starting point is 00:02:38 look for deep shots, get him some opportunities to push the ball down the field. And he actually missed one of those to Higgins, but it was another one. It was a split field look, and that quarter safety isn't doing anything against a wheel route. So just throw the wheel. You got them one-on-one. Is what it is on the miss. He was awesome in the game, so I'm not going to hold that against him too much. Hit some awesome shots while getting blasted as well, pushing the ball down the field.

Starting point is 00:02:59 on the Yosevaish deep ball down the right sideline, I mean, he just gets tattooed on that and still puts it up 45, 50-ish yards right into the bucket down the sideline on the, like on the sideline because it's the only place he could put that ball. So to me, the biggest difference was the willingness to push this ball down the field. Yeah, they had some one-on-one wins with T. Higgins and Jemar Chase. And those guys are amazing. But I don't want to diminish what also was done. in not one-on-one opportunities because it wasn't just ISO ball just keep picking on a corner against T. Higgins with Jamar Chase.

Starting point is 00:03:36 There was a lot of actually pushing this ball down the field, trying to work the safeties, which is something I don't think that they did when this was a Mike McDonald defense. Mike, the offense really got going when Burrow. It felt very 2021 like Burrow finds Jamar Chase late in the second half for a touchdown, deep touchdown, 41 yards, I believe it was. and he gets hit on that one pretty good as well. Take us through that play. Would you see on film? What was because that kind of jump started the offense and they scored on four straight possessions after that scored touchdowns.

Starting point is 00:04:10 That was a big post from Jamar Chase. So he's running like 20 yards down the field. He puts a little sauce out of it. He makes it look like he's going to stem vertical and kind of almost gives a fake back as if he's going to end up running a corner like this is a sale concept or something and then cuts. and Marcus Williams's safety is completely turned around going the wrong direction, makes it an easy throw for Burrow relatively, you know,

Starting point is 00:04:34 like not tight coverage easy throw, but still getting blasted while making the throw because of the protection on those plays when he thinks to develop deep down the field. And that, to me, I think that we talked a bit about how he doesn't really throw that alert post on sale and, you know, posts or something he hasn't thrown that much. This, it was a post, big post that he threw. And big post, I mean, that he's kind of going all. the way across the field horizontally to go with about 20, 30 yards downfield before he makes that

Starting point is 00:05:02 break. And he's thrown the big post before because that was also the same concept, not the same exact concept, but the same route that he threw against the Cardinals deep down the field when everybody thought like, oh, Joe Burrow might be back because he just threw him like 60 yards down the field to Jamar Chase. And I do think that kind of jump started at all. It felt it felt to me like Jamar Chase got to be the explosive play of this game. Not to say he wasn't getting the, you know, 10 yards to keep the chains moving. But it felt like T. Higgins was kind of like that, you know, just keep the offense humming type of thing. When he gets to, he got plenty of one-on-one opportunities because teams still play the Bengals with a lot of cloud or bracket to chase and Higgins just against their best corner.

Starting point is 00:05:44 In this case, Marlon Humphrey. And at times, it was against Brandon Stevens just based on how the defense lined up. But a lot of Marlon Humphrey. And he was winning against him to keep the offense generating just. keep that pushing down the field and then you just get the backbreaker to Jamar Chase either deep down the field like that big post or the little flare screen that he took for 70 yards and a touchdown. So I don't know if it really did anything schematically to open everything up because things are already pretty opened up for the Bengals when they face a defense. It's usually pushed

Starting point is 00:06:15 pretty far back. But I do think it felt like that was a turning point just in terms of you got to double up after with some nice throwing to both Jamar Chase and T. Higgins. Yeah, Joe Burrow really put the team on his back in this game, particularly when he was under pressure. You mentioned average depth of target. You mentioned him making a few throws when he was getting crushed. He was seven for eight in this game on his pressure dropbacks. That's an 87 and a half percent completion percentage. He averaged 19.9 yards per attempt under pressure, which is a very absurd number, had one of his five touchdown passes under pressure, his average depth of target when he was under pressure, 18.9 yards downfield, which is a pretty crazy thing to consider.

Starting point is 00:06:59 Like a lot of times when you're under pressure, you're checking the ball down right at the line of scrimmage. No, Joe Burrow under pressure in this game, really carried probably largely by those two deep balls we talked about, one of them to Jamar Chase, one of them to Andre Yosevash, both of them awesome throws, really pushing the ball downfield on average when he was pressure. in this game. And the other thing that was noteworthy, as you're discussing, Mike, just from a stats perspective, to back that up, they're pushing the ball down field more. He had 13 attempts pushing the ball down field out of his 39 charted attempts by Pro Football Focus. He was 9 of 13 on those attempts, two for three on deep passes, missing the one to T. Higgins

Starting point is 00:07:36 that you mentioned, but hitting on the two others that we've talked about, he was seven for 10 for 10.5 yards per attempt. Those are all really high efficiency rates. for those parts of the field where you tend to have lower efficiency targets and a lower rate of success. Joe Burrow, though, against this defense in the past, has been a tick off. And in this game, and we can talk about his interception, the one bad rep if we want to in a bit, he seemed to be once again at that high level of control that we've seen from him for the last few games. Those against bad defenses, the Ravens I don't think are a bad defense. What did you see from Burrow from a pre-snap perspective,

Starting point is 00:08:14 of the ability to get into the right pre-snap configuration against what he was seeing. Yeah, it felt pretty common for what he's done. You know, you could see one of the things you could look for is just when he's moving the backs and the tight ends around and just kind of yelling out anything that has an L or an R in it. You know, like those are we're looking for when you're talking about changing the protections pre-snap. I wasn't 100% sure if he changed a lot of the routes or anything, but you could hear him kill plays.

Starting point is 00:08:41 It feels like he's just operating control. It kind of goes unnoticed until you watch sometimes some other, you know, probably younger quarterbacks who aren't making these same calls. They don't, or maybe they don't have the freedom to make these calls. But yeah, he is in complete control to change around the offense to make it work. And I do think that it wasn't a game that I go back and I think like that's a game that I could look to as one of Burrough's best pre-snap games. But I do think when you're, you know, your standard of operations for pre-snap is,

Starting point is 00:09:13 is being able to always get to the right protections and right play call. That's pretty nice, even if it's not being tested a ton to me. We have a big injury to discuss an unfortunate season-ending injury. We will get to that. We will get to the defense. We wanted to start with the positives. Joe Burrow, positive, Jamar Chase, positive. The negatives, well, it's injuries in defense.

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Starting point is 00:11:24 and continue your learning journey. Go right now to Hillsdale.org.edu slash locked-on. That's Hillsdale.org slash locked on to enroll. There's no cost. It's easy to get started. That's Hillsdale.edu slash locked on to register. or hillsdale.edu slash locked on. Just before we get to the defense, let's stay on offense for one more topic, if that's okay.

Starting point is 00:11:51 Some positives that I thought were positive anyway. Let's talk about the way the Bengals attack this game from an approach and play-calling perspective, Mike. That big post you talked about to Jamar Chase, we were talking during the game during that play. I don't recall the Bengals running that play in the past. That might be something relatively new for them. Yes, we spent a lot of time yesterday talking about the overtime decision to run the ball three times in a row.

Starting point is 00:12:17 But overall in this game, Mike, on the way to 38 points, from an offensive approach and play calling perspective in terms of attacking weaknesses and coverage and getting to the right route concepts, what did you see from the Bengals passing offense? Yeah, I don't think they ran that specific play before. And it's really good design because it's three by one, but the one is a tight end. And that tight end is just kind of there, hopefully occupying the safety, or not the safety in the corner because they're in cover three. So on that side of the field, there's a corner playing the third, which the Bengals did this too, and it went terrible. But so he does that. And that allows Chase to be free against the safety and push the ball downfield on that big post. And then you have like another deep route that's, you could throw it.

Starting point is 00:13:02 It's just really to occupy the other third. It's just a perfect play call for that situation to get Jamar Chase isolated against the safety. because I don't think the safeties want to be isolated against Jamar Chase or any high-end wide receiver. You know, they're back there theoretically. But, you know, it's great to draw it up on a chalkboard how it's going to be drawn out. But when you have Jar Chase sauce and you have 20 yards down field, it's a little bit more, a little bit more threatening. I thought they kind of got to like their greatest hits, you know. They're running some of the stuff that's always worked.

Starting point is 00:13:30 A lot of slant routes, a lot of Dragon Lion, which this actually we did talk about, I can't complain about Dragon or Lion in the low Red Zone anymore because it worked for two touchdowns to T. Higgins because it's not really a play that you generally run in the Red Zone, but they must have seen something in the low Red Zone close to the end zone there. But they must have seen something that made them think these are available on film. And they were both in Zone and Man when they got in those situations for Higgins. Dragon being, by the way, the Slant Flat, the Slant Flat, Lion being the Double Slant. The slant flat think of Chase Brown's touchdown. The double slant think of like T. Higgins touchdown. They're killing the Ravens on slants the entire game until the interception.

Starting point is 00:14:10 Yeah, just wanted to clarify those concepts. Yep, neither. Yeah. But quick game. It shouldn't work, but it did. They must have known. I thought they really just got to the, like I said, their greatest hits. They also ran, you know, the, it's bow in the Shanahan world, but it's got a bunch of different names.

Starting point is 00:14:28 It's just you sit a guy down in front of the zone defender and you run a little in route behind it. And when the guy comes up, you throw the end route. If he stays back, you throw the little sit. And then they also got to their isolated stuff where I'm talking about like the stop routes on the outside, just run eight yards, turn around. And these are physical stuff. That sounds great. But these are physical routes because Marlon Humphrey and all these guys are trying to jam the heck out of T. Higgins when he's running these, but he's winning on them out routes. And it just felt like a great mixture of like the greatest hits of the Bengals past along with a little bit of this new 12 personnel, run the ball, get some play action, deep shot evolution in there as well.

Starting point is 00:15:06 You can think of the Yosuvaj play. I mean, that's also kind of a great assist to throw a go ball down the sideline, no matter what the coverage is, just because I'm Joe Burrow and I could fit this anywhere I want to because pinpoint accuracy. Yeah, that's basically what I saw. It wasn't that different. It's not like I came in this game. I was like, whoa, what's that concept? What's that? They're running a lot of the staple stuff, which is normal. That's what you rep the most. And you're going to run feel the most comfortable with. But they also mixed in a little bit of some new stuff to push that ball. And remember, another dig being thrown to Jamar Chase, just plenty of stuff in there that just goes like, okay, like maybe they've run this before, but it hasn't been

Starting point is 00:15:44 a key part of the offense mixed in with, yeah, we've got Jamar Chase and T. Higgins and they're awesome. So let's isolate them and try to get some wins that way too. Yeah, that Burrow Boba Yoshi touched the, if there was, if it was a dome, would have touched the top of the dome. For sure. I mean, it was a rainbow. Let's get to the worst news of the podcast, which will set the tone for a unit that is just bad, bad. And then when you think it can't get worse, it does get worse. But the Bengals defense stinks and it's going to be worse because Daxels out for the year.

Starting point is 00:16:16 Multiple reports confirm torn ACL as we record this. That was the vibe Sunday after the game. didn't want to say it in the post-game pod because you just never know. Maybe the things end up being better than it felt. But it did not feel great when talking to people with the Bengals after the game. So Daxil out for the year. Let's start there, Mike. The Bengals defense, we've discussed it.

Starting point is 00:16:41 It's bad. We know it's really bad. It doesn't take film breakdowns or podcast hosts to discuss it or say it for people to know it. But Daxhill, probably their best cover corner through Ford. plus games? Where do they go without him? Because it feels like a pretty big loss. Definitely at least the most consistent, if not the best. You go to DJ Turner. That's the nice thing about having that answer there. I will say DJ Turner showed up in a positive way against the Panthers. I thought in a negative way in this game. It didn't seem like he was

Starting point is 00:17:12 hanging with say Flowers very well at all. And that feels like stylistically a guy he should be able to hang around with. Like he moves really well. Turner moves really well. Let's put him against each other and flowers got the better of him. It's tough. I mean, it's a big spot for Turner. This is the one part about the team that kind of has a little bit of, to me, would have at least the smallest amount of depth would be the corner room because you have a second round pick from last year that can step into that role. And Mike Kilton probably comes back. You know, they had to go to Newton in this game a little bit, but it seemed like Mike Kilton was kind of like on the verge of playing, got ruled out.

Starting point is 00:17:50 I would think he can come back if he can't come back. You know, it's a short-term injury. So long-term, it stinks. You're losing your best corner. But at least this is probably the one position group you have a little bit of depth then. We'll need to talk about whether there's hope for the rest of the secondary because they're defensive issues from back to front. They're defensive issues between the ears.

Starting point is 00:18:11 There are defensive issues physically from an athleticism perspective. We'll continue on the topic of this disaster defense and a trend that, is worryingly continuing in the negative to finish up the show coming up next. Today's show is brought to you by game time. The Bengals play on Sunday night football. And maybe like me, you will join me in New York to watch the Bengals play on Sunday night football. And maybe you're thinking about going, maybe even have your plane ticket books or you live

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Starting point is 00:19:04 And whether it's their panoramic views that give you awesome views of your seat that show you exactly what you're going to get to their all-in pricing, take the guesswork out of buying tickets with Game Time. Download the GameTime app, create an account, and use code locked on NFL for $20 off your first purchase terms apply again creating account and redeem code l o c ed o nfl locked on nfl for $20 off download game time today what time is it game time guys on the defensive side of the ball it is a mess and we've seen it against good offenses really for the last few weeks and then the panthers but on the topic of the secondary losing dachshel obviously a blow there can't

Starting point is 00:19:50 Taylor Britt, still a bit of a mixed bag. He had a couple of nice plays in this game. He also got beat deep. The safeties are verging on, if not already, an unmitigated disaster. Mike, when you look at this secondary, is there reason to believe that it will be better? I mean, we've got communication issues.

Starting point is 00:20:11 We've got slow safeties. It seems like it's a lot to ask for these guys to get better. I mean, for me, no. I just, well, my hope was kind of Jordan battle. He gets in there and he gets cooked too. I'm like, oh, dang, man. They got no action. Even my cope's gone.

Starting point is 00:20:33 I don't think I'm going to cope about the seventh round safety to be the answer to this defense. It's tough. Yeah, the safeties are a disaster right now. And we can talk just, I kind of mentioned it earlier. The Bengals run of cover three look against, another formation where you only have tight ends to one side of the field. So they use Von Bell as the deep third player there.

Starting point is 00:20:55 Great in theory. Draw it up on a chalkboard. A go route from a blocking tight end should not beat that. And yet you see Charlie Kohler run down the field as their third tight end, mostly a blocker and outrun Von Bell up the sideline for a huge game. How's that? I mean, I guess a linebacker, sure, but Bell just looked like he was running in mud. It's just.

Starting point is 00:21:17 And that's tough because the other end of that is Gino Stone doesn't look very athletic either. He's not giving them the support that you're looking for. And then this is all supposed to be because the communication was so bad last year from the safeties. There's still miscommunications and missed assignments everywhere. And not even just from young guys. You can think of the play where they ran where the Ravens had a shallow against a zero look. They got some hot droppers, but it's still zero. No safety over the top. Can't Taylor Britt is pointing. I'm passing this off. To who? Nobody

Starting point is 00:21:51 picks it up. And he's just running right up the sideline. Easy. Just easy stuff. And then you end up with Cant Taylor Britt trying to take the running back. So maybe you're supposed to pass him to Von Bell. I don't know. One of those two is wrong there. And I'm getting to the point where I don't really care who's wrong. Another play. Tampa 2. This is the green dot of the defense and the captain of the defense. They drop to the same zone. And it's only an 11-yard. game, whatever. But yeah, there's a wide open void in the zone because they ran Tampa 2. There's no weak hook defender. Just such easy stuff for Lamar Jackson. Just be like, why are there two guys pole running down the middle of the Tampa 2 and nobody on the weak side?

Starting point is 00:22:30 Just dump, easy, 11 yards. Like, you can't be having these type of breakdowns. And they're not even from the young guys. They're from the vets, the guys that you would trust the most to be in the right spots. You're still not getting correct assignments done. You're still not communicating well enough apparently. So I just, I'm lost on what is the answer for this? Because I don't really have it on the back end. The pass rush is still a disaster. So that's not getting better. The one thing you can point to is that they stopped the run pretty well in this game. They got into a four four at times, like the 85 bears to stop the run with Muma and Jong Mehta put into the game with four defensive linemen and Akeem Davis gave. They had a corner off the field. It was Von Bell, Geno Stone, Camp,

Starting point is 00:23:11 Taylor Britt and a four four up front. I don't know the last time I've seen the outside of goal line situations. They were doing a midfield. So yeah, they stopped the run, but at what cost? Yeah. It's, uh, it's, it's, it's Lou trying to figure it out, right?

Starting point is 00:23:27 And piece it together. And the mad scientist part of it isn't, isn't science. I was going to say scientisting, but neither one is working. And that's how well the safeties are playing. Look, the safety stink. That's the part, like, is Sam Hubbard. It's taken a ton of criticism. Fine. Get it. Who knows how hurt he is or not hurt. The pass rush. We knew that that was going to be a weakness. We did. Coming in. We were like, yeah, it's Trey Hendrickson and then who. And maybe Miles Murphy emerges. Maybe one of these young defensive tackles gets better as time goes on. Or Sheldon Rankins gives them a boost starting next week if he can come back. But remember? It was like, Gino Stone, the communication. He's going to be able to cover so much ground and be this Bawawk on the back end. Bauhawk? Can you just. get near and near

Starting point is 00:24:13 Isaiah likely a tight end that you should be able to keep up with in a situation where there's no way the Ravens should score a touchdown there on that play after Lamar Jackson bobbles the ball and Sam Hubbard stiff armed into the ground. It still shouldn't have been a touchdown and yet it was. Like

Starting point is 00:24:29 safety-wise, I really do wonder Tyson Anderson runs a sub-4-4. Like, you got to get some kind of speed out there. And Jordan battles a 4-5 guy. Geno Stone's not fast. Von Bell, you mentioned it, Cinderblocks.

Starting point is 00:24:46 So maybe that's the route. Maybe they mix in Jordan Battle a little bit more. You say he only had eight snaps. You give him some snaps. And you look at a guy like Tyson Anderson who did make plays last year in the preseason when he had his opportunities at free safety. This is what we're talking about. I mean, Tyson Anderson, we're talking about Dejan Anthony.

Starting point is 00:25:06 We're talking about Jordan Battle. We're talking about it. Can he be worse than Gino Stone? Can Tyson really be like honestly? Like I've seen him tackle. I've seen him tackle. Five safeties on this team. They kept five safeties on this team.

Starting point is 00:25:19 And it's and we're talking about the safeties again. Maybe Mike and I were talking about this after the game. Maybe this is a defense that just needs a Jesse Bates level safety to function. And if that's what you need in your defense for you to be a functional defense, your defense probably isn't very sustainable for one. And two, you probably should have kept Jesse Bates. that's keep hammering on that point as we look at safeties that are struggling.

Starting point is 00:25:43 But it's like a back-to-front issue, right? You've got the pass-rush issue. Sorry, Jay. Do you want to jump in with a point there before I move on? Yeah, just real quick, safety. Are they worse at safety this year than last year? Because I think so. I think they're worse.

Starting point is 00:25:56 I mean, it's similar at best, right? Like, it's bad. I mean, cheese, oh, Pete's just because they're not even, like, at least Dax got his hand on a couple balls. Like, when's that? last time one of these safeties made a play on the ball and you're still taking bad angles like the issue with that we ended up having with dax is you have the miscommunication issues and you have the bad angles issues and we still have miscommunication issues and we still have bad angle issues

Starting point is 00:26:23 and no and no plays on the the ball doesn't even get touched unless they touch it when the official is trying to grab it from the tight end in bossing one there there's that one time uh but geno stone didn't make the play but but where i was going was you've got these issues throughout the defense, right? Like we haven't even seen a good game from Trey Hendrickson, really, since the Chiefs game. He's been Trey Hendrickson, but he's been going against some better tackles. He hasn't been winning. He hasn't been single-handedly putting the defense on his back.

Starting point is 00:26:51 And when that doesn't happen, he's been dealing with some injuries too. You look at his snap counts. It seems obvious that he's not playing as much as he would if he were fully healthy, I believe. But we don't know anything about that for sure. He's not been on injury reports. But when you have consistent issues of safety, you've got consistent issues tackling, You've got consistent communication issues, even with your veterans. You don't have a pass rush.

Starting point is 00:27:12 You have to sell out to stop anything, which is why I think they can get a stop here or there for one play, but can't tie things together. There are times where Lou has put his defense in a position to sell out to stop a thing, and they can do it on a play. But if you don't guess right, the next play, well, that's the first down for the offense. And so when you have these issues and some of them persistent year over year,

Starting point is 00:27:35 at that point, I guess I wonder, Mike, from your presentation, perspective, are they still calling the right things? Like, is Lou putting guys in positions where they should be able to make plays and the guys just aren't making plays in your mind? Or is this an unmitigated disaster all the way to the top? And we're getting into bad looks. We're gambling too much. We're pressing in terms of play calling. And then the players also are missing tackles and not winning their one-on-one assignments. It feels to me like it usually starts with the former where they're in the right position. And then there's just some type of communication, misassignment, et cetera, issue.

Starting point is 00:28:07 And then sometimes you talk about players pressing. It does feel like Lou is just searching, scrambling for some type of answer. They ran a 3-3 nickel at one point to try to get a Keem Davis-Gather for some extra speed on the field. That didn't work. They talked about the 4-4. It's just they're getting all these different looks. And, yeah, they're running coverages out of it that aren't crazy.

Starting point is 00:28:27 They're running, you know, your standard zone coverages for the most part, you know, two and four, six, et cetera. A little bit of man. mixed in there as well, but not so much against Lamar Jackson, because you like to keep eyes on him. And then they're trying to blitz a lot, too. And I feel like the blitzes came at a weird time, too, because it was right before the Bengals got the ball back

Starting point is 00:28:47 for what was supposed to be the put away drive. But why aren't you just, like, shelling them, just keep everybody back and just make the rainers take as much time as possible to work down the field. It felt like they were trying to finally get to an answer of a pass rush and blitz him. It just felt like the wrong time to me. And that just, to me, kind of looked at, like,

Starting point is 00:29:03 I don't think lose a bad play. color, but he doesn't have any answers with this defense. One point I want to make here is we watched two eligible offensive linemen catch touchdowns in back-to-back weeks. It was essentially the same play that got Isaiah Lake, Isaiah likely just butt naked in the end zone to catch his touchdown too. How is that three times in five weeks that it's just a play action from about the one-yard line and everybody just like you're talking about sells out?

Starting point is 00:29:31 Yeah, it's like you just everybody, if it's a run fake, just pile in. there corners, safeties, whoever. You're on the outside. You have no shot of making this tackle. Get in there. And nobody watches the tight end leak out into the end zone for an easy touchdown. If there's one thing I think we can all agree on, listeners, viewers included, no one wants to see Isaiah likely butt-making.

Starting point is 00:29:57 No one. On that note, we will wrap up a podcast in which we have praised Joe Burrow and lamenting. the defense that looks answerless, looks hapless, and needs badly to turn around if the Bengals are going to have any hope of salvaging this season, which is already a very difficult task. We were joined today on Locked on Bengals by Mike Santagogy. You can find him at Bengals underscore stands on Twitter,

Starting point is 00:30:26 writing for Bengals Talk on Sports Illustrated podcasting at us always game day in Cincinnati if you're looking for more of Mike's content. Until next time, Bengals fans, that's going to do it for this episode of the Lockdown Bengals podcast. Take care of yourselves and have a good one.

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