The Ringer NFL Show - Will the Bengals Make the Playoffs This Year?

Episode Date: July 26, 2022

Steven and Danny get together to debate whether the Cincinnati Bengals can repeat their success from last season despite a much harder schedule and an incredibly loaded AFC. Hosts: Steven Ruiz and Danny Heifetz Associate Producer: Chris Sutton Production Supervision: Conor Nevins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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My name is Danny Hafeits, and I am joined by Stephen Ruiz. And we are counting down the days until the NFL season kicks off. off on September 8th. And today, Stephen and I are going to talk about the most divisive topic that has come up at our preseason NFL discussions here at the Ringer. And that most divisive question is this. Stephen, the Bengals made the Super Bowl last season, but do you think the Bengals will make the playoffs in 2022? We're starting off hot. The tough questions first. Short answer is no. I don't think I'm going to predict them to make the playoffs. But I think there's a lot of explanation that goes beyond that. I think they're going to be a better team compared

to the team they were in 2020. I know that doesn't make a lot of sense, but we're going to explain that today. I actually agree with you. And I think people think we're crazy. Like, I'm sure people listening think we're nuts. I mean, my co-hosts in the fantasy football show, Craig Horleck and Danny Kelly think I'm insane. Bill Simmons said we were crazy. Basically, they just came off the Super Bowl. I mean, Jamar Chase and Joe Burrow are incredible. The Bengals met their offensive line better this off season, why would the Bengals not be better this year? I guess you're saying they will be, but they'll miss anyway. Yeah, I just think there's too many regression factors working against them. They got a lot of breaks to make the Super Bowl. When you're a 10 and 7th team and you're

a wildcard team, well, they won their division, but they're playing on the wildcard weekend. You need breaks to make the Super Bowl. And going into the last, what, the last six weeks of the season, including the postseason, no one was viewing them as Super Bowl contenders. They were like nine and six. They were, I think they were third or second in the AFC North, which banged up AFC North. Even the Steelers who stayed relatively healthy weren't the same Steelers were used to just because Ben Rothsberger wasn't the same player. And then when you look at other factors like injuries, they were very lucky. They stayed healthy and their opponents were more injured than any other team in the NFL. This is a staff from football outsiders.

If you look at adjusted games lost, the gap between that, they were first in terms of opponent adjusted games. lost, the gap between them and second place was as big as the gap between second place and 16th place. So they were just on another level. Wait, wait, wait. So, wait, that's crazy. Yeah. So the people they were playing each week were the most injured opponents in the entire league. Yeah, by a wide margin. By a wide margin. That's not sustainable. And those are things that are out of their control, obviously. So I don't think they're going to catch those same breaks. And it's not just the injuries. It's field goals, too. Like, their opponents missed a number of field goals. The difference between their

field goals and the opponent's field goals was minus 9.9. That was like one of the biggest marks in the league. It was second to the Patriots. And that's also a thing that doesn't carry over year to year. So those are like just free points right there plus the injuries. And I don't think it's a coincidence that this team was really struggling in the first half, not struggling, but mediocre. And then in the second half they took off, when do injuries usually start to matter? When do they start to pile up? The second half of the season and this, like they played the Ravens in the second half when the Ravens were down to like their 10th cornerback. And unsurprisingly, the Bengals dropped like 50 points on them.

I completely agree with you. I think a Bengals fan would probably be screaming right now that in the first 14 weeks of the season they had like 19 turnovers and then their final eight games, including the playoffs. They had two. But also that's really hard to do. Did you just have two turnovers in the final eight? Like to your point, their schedule last year, like Warren Sharp, the adjusted schedule, strength of schedule.

It was like the second easiest, I think, in the entire league. And this year it's going to be the 20. hardest schedule or the 26th easiest. Like 32, 1, I get back. It's the 26th easiest in last year they were the second. It's the biggest difference in the entire league year over year. And like, that's not an accident. That's the price of going worse to first in the NFL.

The way the NFL schedule works is you play the other last place teams. It's like you play your division six times. You play a division each conference. And then the other teams are rounded out by like, so basically they're playing like the chiefs last year because they're in the UFC West. And they're playing like all these other first place teams. whereas the year before, when they were in last place schedule, they had the worst team.

So I just look at the Bengals and I'm like, everything went right for them last year. And they had 10 wins. And then you look at a team like the Ravens and everything went wrong for the Ravens. And the Ravens had eight wins. And the Ravens were like the most injured team in the league. If you don't look at everywhere except quarterback. Yeah.

And beyond that, like even in the playoffs, I mean, they're a goal line stand away from losing to the Raiders at home on wild card weekend. And then the next week they needed a Ryan Tannahill just a meltdown, three interceptions, just a terrible game from him. And they gave up nine sacks in a playoff game and one. I don't think that had ever happened before. And it required a last second field goal too.

And then you need Patrick Mahomes to play the worst half of his life. And I give a lot of credit to the defense for making that happen. But there were some plays where like the interception, the first interception, it's a screen pass and he just throws it right to a defender. That's not really like good scheme or good defense. It's just a boneheaded play by Patrick Mahomes. So it took a lot of breaks to get where they were. And I think it's going to be hard for them to get.

back there. Now, having said that, there are a lot of areas of improvement. So the question is, are those areas of improvement going to outweigh the regression factors we just talked about? And that's the key with them getting back to the postseason for me. It is a young team, and Bengals fans will tell you that. We were a young team. We came on in the second half, and we expect to carry that momentum over into this year. There's just no precedent for that being a thing. Like, football outsiders has been adamant about that. Just, because you were good in the second half doesn't mean you're going to carry that over. So in order for Cincinnati to improve on what they did last year, I think they had to buck a lot

of historical trends. But part of me hates this conversation. I'm not going to lie because we're talking about like there's nothing worse than like, well, they have Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase, but you know math and regression. And it's kind of the most annoying form of analysis. I don't think that we have to even talk about regression. I mean, that is what we're talking about basically like you're probably not going to be the most injured team and you're just your schedules harder.

But can I just go through their schedule with you, like to give an idea of how to do it. Because people, I really think it's, it sounds like a hot take to say the Bengals might miss the playoffs. But this is their schedule. Obviously, they play their own division. So that means Ravens twice, Steelers twice, Browns twice. Before they have a week 10 by. Before they're by, they have to go to Dallas and they have to go to the Saints. And then can I read you Cincinnati schedule after their week 10 by?

Yeah, do it. At Pittsburgh, who, whatever you say was the playoff team last year, at Tennessee. who was the number one seat in the AFC last year. Now we're in December. Kansas City, Cleveland, at Tampa Bay, at New England, at Buffalo. In January, they're at Buffalo, Baltimore. So in their final eight games, they're playing six playoff teams, and the other two games are divisional games.

That's brutal. They have no margin for error in the first half of the season. None whatsoever. Exactly. None whatsoever. It's tough. The NFL's tough. They have to basically start six and two to, like, be in pole.

position for the playoffs because you can't expect to go in that final eight game stretch and come out six and two. So again, I think that that's just the point. Also, the AFC's loaded. That's the other piece of this. The AFC is so popular. There's so many good teams in the AFC. I mean, again, if we kind of just can put, we slot in the bills in the AFC East, if we slot in, maybe this is non-fair, but we slot in the chiefs in the AFC West and, you know, let's say the culture of the Titans in the AFC South. We're talking about, I mean, the Patriots, the Dolphins, the Browns, the Steelers, the Bengals, the Titans, the Raiders, the Broncos, the Chargers. Five of those teams are missing the playoffs.

So even though it sounds like a hot take with the Bengals, I mean, two or three really good AFC teams have to have to miss this year. Yeah. And just getting bad breaks is enough to do it. Like, say Joe Burrow rolls his ankle one game and misses two games, two pivotal games, like that's enough in the AFC to miss out on the playoffs. We are being very negative. I think we should like steer it to a positive direction. and talk about the areas of improvement that I think we could see.

Because I think Joe Burrow is, he was the second year player. And really, like, he only had half a rookie season. There's been a lot of talk about him being a superstar, being elite, but there's a lot of room to grow for him. And I think we're going to see that show up in the SAC department. I think that's more important, like his progress than the acquisitions they made this offseason, which I think we're good and necessary. But I don't think it changed.

their terrible offensive line into one of the best in the league. I think it turned their terrible offensive line into an average one. So those acquisitions, they signed Lel Collins to be the right tackle, probably, who was Cowboys right tackle. They got Ted Karras and they got Alex Kappa. Alex Kappa was one of the guards for the Buccaneers. And so they basically kind of changed up really almost their entire offensive line. I would say probably improved at every position.

Is that fair to say? Yeah, yeah, definitely. So why do you think Joe Burrow being more comfortable is more important than actually getting him in the line. I think Joe Burrow was, along with David Carr for the expansion Texans, the only quarterback to be sacked 70 times in his season, including the playoffs. So why is improving the line? You're like, you sound unimpressed by this. No, it's not that. I just think that Joe Burrow, like, this is the next step in his development is that pre-snap phase. I do think he was like in charge of calling out the protections, which is very impressive for a second year

player. And not surprising, given his like pre-draft scouting report, he was billed as like a smart player, but he missed some things. Like when you're a second year player, you're going to miss some looks. You're going to maybe slide the protection the wrong way. Like the Bengals had a lot of free rushers. You can't put free rushers totally on the offensive line. The quarterback has to know where the pressure is coming from. And I think that's one area where Joe Burrow needs to improve if he's going to be like

that Tom Brady style field general type. Because that was the big deal with this offense. They relied on explosives. And I don't think they relied on explosive explosives because they were bad. at like doing the taking the layups. I think it was because of all those sacks. Like it's hard to string together a 12 played drive when it's getting disrupted by sack

and turning and putting you in like second and 15. That's funny. Can I read you a Joe Burrow quote? Let's hear it. I think that that's actually really instructive because I, first of all, that makes sense about the free rusher thing. I could be wrong.

I think I saw a stat that said the Bengals had the most free rushers of any team. I could be wrong about that. Yeah, it was by a wide margin too. It was by a lot. Yeah, yeah, that's what I thought. Okay. So the Joe Burrow quote,

if I can pull it up, He said, someone basically said what you just said about taking sacks, blaming the offensive line, like I did earlier. And Burroughs said, here's the thing about sacks. There's good sacks and there's bad sacks. You look at the stats, yeah, I got sacked a lot. But you look at when they happened and he says, third down sacks, who cares about third down sacks? I'm going to try to extend the play as long as I can to get the first down on third down, unless I'm in field goal range, then I'll throw the ball away and get some points. And his point was, so when you hear that, do you think that the sack thing is overrated?

or do you think that I don't is he just standing up for his offensive line? I think it's a little bit of both. I think he's totally right. Like there are good sacks. There's a good time to take a sack and I would say third down is one of them. But I do think a lot of those sacks happen on first and second down two and they disrupted drives, which is why some of their efficiency metrics, like for instance, they were a mediocre team by DVOA because DVOA puts a lot of emphasis on down-to-down consistency.

So those sacks really mattered. They still had a high sack rate on first and second down. So it wasn't just a third down sack thing. And beyond the protection thing, like Joe Burrow seeing things pre-snap, when he was under pressure, I think he took the highest rate of sacks in the NFL, according to the pro football focus. So he wasn't really escaping pressure as much as when you watch his highlights, you see him scrambling and making a play on the run. But a lot of times those pressure dropbacks turned into those sacks. So I think it's also him kind of finding the perfect middle ground. between being that playmaker who's willing to hold onto the ball

to let his receivers get open and just throwing it away sometimes to keep a drive alive. So what's the version of this where the people who right now think we're idiots, the version of this where we are idiots, where the Bengals are incredible, the Bengals are the number one sitting in the AFC. They get like 14, 15 wins, and the Bengals' offense is incredible. What improvements does Joe Burrow make as a quarterback this season over last season that makes you,

like what turns the Bengals into a Death Star offense with Burrow improvement? I think those that I've covered already And then when we're recording this, the Mike Sando piece came out today, the quarterback tiers. And there's a quote from, I don't know what his job title is, but there's an anonymous quote in there.

And he talks about how if you change the picture after the snap, like it hurts Burrow. Like he hasn't really caught up in that aspect of his game. And I think that's another step he has to take is being able to adjust post snap based on the look. He's getting a one look pre-snap. Sometimes they'll disguise the coverage and rotate to another coverage,

and that still gives him a little bit of trouble, which that's not like a criticism. He's a second year quarterback, and that stuff's going to come with the experience. But I think that's another vital step he needs to take, along with like the past protection, calling out, like pointing out the mic and doing all that correctly. If he takes those two steps,

then disregard everything we've said on this podcast, because I think their offense will take a massive leap, and it will look like the offense we saw late in the season. Now, if it's just like baby steps in those areas, areas, now I think you put the onus on the defense to kind of carry over that momentum they had in the playoffs. Because the defense really carried them to the Super Bowl. Their offense was okay during the playoffs, but it was their defense that really stepped up and carried them. And I don't know if that's going to happen again. As a group, there's a decent amount of talent there and they

look like a good unit, but there's not a lot of like star power. So I don't know if we can say, yeah, that defense is definitely going to be as good as it was in the postseason last year. And their defense was also really healthy last year. And those groups that put together by free agency, it's hard for them to stick together year by year, or year over year rather. So with all this said, the Bengals, just to win the AFC North, the Ravens are slight favorites over the, but the Ravens are the favorite team to win the AFC North on Fendell Sportsbook, plus 170, which basically means like a 38% chance.

The Bengals are plus 185, which basically means like a 36% chance. The Browns are like plus 260, which is like 25% basically. still there's a plus 1,000, which is like 10%. With those odds, which team is the best bet to win the division? I still say the Ravens. Even with them being the favorite, I just think they're the best team on paper. And what happened last year isn't going to happen this year. Their whole roster isn't going to get decimated.

It happened before the season and it just continued on into the season. They're not going to have to play their 10th string defensive back in a key divisional game. At least I don't think if they do. Well, he lost three running backs before week one. I mean, other than like a team losing its quarterback, like how can you get more injured than they were last year? But wider AFC, so just in terms of winning the conference, or actually no, let's just stick with making the playoffs here.

The Bengals are minus 144 to make, basically, Vegas is saying they have a 60% chance to make the playoffs, 45% chance to not make it because they take a cut, so it doesn't add up to 100. Would you basically, or would you be betting on, no, the Bengals will not make the playoffs? at basically like a 1.2 to one payout? Yeah, I definitely would.

I definitely would. I would not be surprised by like a nine and nine and eight season. And we look back at it at this time next year and we're like, oh, the Bengals, they took a step back. But I think they're going to take a massive step forward in 2023. I think that could totally happen. We see it all the time. I forget what it's called. The Plexiglass theory.

I think football outsider is going out. Oh, yeah. I mean, worse to first. And then it's like you have to fall down because, the concept of going worse to first meant you probably hit your ceiling of outcomes, and it's hard to do that. It's unlikely to do that multiple times. I also think there's a bigger picture of like the AFC where Riley McAtee,

one of our NFL editors here pointed this out, where basically the AFC is so many good quarterbacks now. You've got Josh Allen. You've got Lamar Jackson. You've got Joe Burrow. You've got Patrick Mahomes, Russell Wilson, Justin Herbert. That's seven quarterbacks. Realistically, one of them is going to miss the.

playoffs at least every year. And so you kind of, it sounds hot takey, but it's like, they're not all going to make the playoffs. And I think that this year, the way it's stacked up, the Bengals schedule, it just, it wouldn't shock me at all. And I actually probably am going to throw it down this bet on Fandall Sportsbook. Yeah, I totally agree. And I know Bengals fans are going to take this as like a slight against them and they're going to say we're hating, but it's just a rational thought in my mind. I don't know. I think they're going to be a better team. And I think all the improvements will pay off. And I think they're headed in the right direction. And they're going to be a factor in this division and conference for the next 10 years.

I just think there are a lot of things working against them for this particular season. Okay, we'll see. And also, Bengals fans, if this pissed you off, you can clip this. You can send it to Joe Burrow and Jamar Chase. They can use it as motivation. And then when they make the playoffs, they can thank us for the inspiration. How does that say? Yeah, they can clip it.

We'll take the attention on Twitter. Any attention is good. Perfect. All right. You're welcome, Bengals fans. Okay. Thank you, Stephen. Thank you, Chris Sutton, for producing this episode.

ringer NFL show, counting down to the September 8th kickoff for this coming season. Thank you, Stephen. And again, once again, you are welcome to everyone in Cincinnati. Congrats on making the playoffs or not.