Bengals have been ‘outplayed’ despite 2-0 record to begin season | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC

Bengals have been ‘outplayed’ despite 2-0 record to begin season | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC

PFT Live Monday, September 15, 2025 in Cincinnati. It’s Cincinnati. what the hell are you talking about? And then I tell the story. I mean, you know, my dad who grew up not far from there, he couldn’t even say it right. Well, they played in Cincinnati yesterday, the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Cincinnati Bengals, and it was a back and forth affair. It was a crazy one. There were ups, there were downs, there were highs, there were lows. And even with Joe Burrow knocked out due to injury and we’ll talk about that in a minute. But Jake Browning had to come in and he overcame not one, not two, three interceptions, bad throws, bad decisions, but ultimately the Bengals pulled it off in part because the Jaguars made plenty of bad decisions and blunders of their own. Yeah. Yeah. It’s um it it you know the Jaguars when they play their best are impressive. That game was there to be had yesterday. It was I mean they they they they were the better football team. It’s amazing. The Bengals are 2 and 0 and they’ve been outplayed in both football games in my opinion. The Browns were better than them last week. The Jaguars were better yesterday. But the Jaguars being a younger team, new head coach, finding their way, capitalizing in moments to make sure you control a game or put a team away, that was an issue. It was It was an issue. It certainly was. I mean, from the get-go, the Jaguars go right down the field, score a touchdown. It’s 7 nothing. They stop the the Bengals. I think they go three and out. Oh, there was a play that looked like a fumble. Joe Burrow might have fumbled and it was questionable. You and we all thought I think that might be a fumble. And the ruling on the field of an incomplete pass was upheld on replay view. But as we were watching with this is going to be a fumble and it’s going to be another Jaguars touchdown. Joe Burrow was chasing him. I don’t He didn’t think it was incomplete. You know, that’s to me always the telltale when the quarterback gets up and he’s running like a a bat out of hell. He’s thinks he did something wrong. He’s not like, “Oh, I’m just going to go down there and try to make a tackle because the ref’s letting the play go on.” So, yeah. But in that moment, there they are. 7 nothing. Here’s the first mistake of the day by the Jacksonville Jaguars. 7 nothing. Got a chance to go up at least 10- nothing. Really, probably 14- nothing. Trevor Lawrence throws an interception in the end zone. And it was ugly. It was ugly. I understand the idea. Here we are, though. Third and goal. There it is. Kind of getting hit. He tries to force a ball and he’s going to have to make the most perfect throw ever to get that ball in there to Travis Hunter. You see, he’s got pressure. Trey Hendricks showed up a few times yesterday in some big moments and that was one of them right there. I get the idea, but under pressure early in a football game up 7 nothing, the riskreward’s not worth it right there. That was the first mistake of the day. So there they are. They could have been up 10 nothing, maybe 14 nothing. They don’t they don’t capitalize. It opens the door for a long drive and the Bengals tie it up seven all with a Joe Burrow touchdown pass to Jamar Chase. And then right back down the field the Jaguars go. And the Jaguars can run the football. Liam Conn is a master in the run game. They got two two running backs and ETN and uh Bio Bioshell Tutin who they drafted out of Virginia Tech. That’s why we now know why they traded Tanks. Exactly. Right. Right. I mean Tutin was one of my favorite running backs coming out in the draft. He he’s got three rockets up his butt and he can fly and you will continue to see him make plays throughout. His touchdown that was the one that made a 14. I mean, it it really was. I mean, you use the phrase rocket up the ass from time to time. He was moving like he literally had a rocket ass. He was and you and I we you picked the Bengals. I picked the Jaguars. I know you were nervous. You’re like, man, that just looked easy for the Jaguars right now. And it wasn’t easy for the Bengals, but they hang around. They hang around. They stay in it. And then we have the moment where Joe Burrow gets hurt. And come on. I mean, that hurts my soul. It hurts everybody. I mean, everybody wants to see Joe Burrow. Joe Burrow’s awesome when he stays healthy. It’s just staying healthy ain’t been that easy for him in his career. And it’s kind of a weird play. I mean, one, I kept thinking it was his right leg because that’s the leg Eric Armstead was holding as he brought him down, but it was actually his left to big toe here, his left toe. So, watch it. I mean, nobody falls on it and just must get stuck in a bad position. You’re going to see here. Look, there’s Eric Armstead. He’s holding on the right. There’s nothing crazy that happens to that left foot, but either way, it’s a problem. And now he’s got turf toe. And for all those people out there who want to know what turf, I remember when I first heard of it in the 70s, I thought, oh, that doesn’t sound that exactly right. I think that’s everybody’s thought. Like, oh, you could play through turftoe. No, you can’t. Let me I’ve had little just minor turf toe and you can’t believe how annoying it is and how long it lingers. I I tell people all the time, Deion Sanders had to retire cuz of turf toe. That’s why he retired. It it’s it’s you you get that that that that big toe ball, the joint there, it gets moved, stretched out of place, the ligament stretch, and then where that toe connects to that ball, there’s a problem there. From then time out, it calcifies and it has a hard time moving. It’s hard to make it heal because when you walk, your toes bend. So, it’s a hard thing to do that way. And yeah, it looks like and from what you’re hearing, it sounds like that they expect him to be gone for quite some time. Well, and think about I mean, stand up right now wherever you are, unless you’re driving. And and as you push off, as you’re walking, that’s the last thing that leaves the ground, right? Is that area on your big toe, that pad right there, so much pressure, so much weight, everything is there. And if you’re feeling that, yeah, you’re gonna you’re going to have a hard time. Patrick Mahomes played with turf toe up until the Super Bowl five years ago against the Bucks. Had surgery literally three days later, right, to get it fixed. And that’s where they are now. Do you manage it? Do you shoot it up every week and do you keep going? Or do you fix it surgically and miss about three months? And that’s kind of where it currently stands. As I was told yesterday as we were getting ready for football night in America, there was debate over whether or not to have surgery. That kind of became crystallized when the reports started to come out last night. Dr. Robert Anderson and hey, surgeons like to to surge. They they want the scalpel. They don’t want the needle. And we’ll see where it goes. And look, Joe Burrow is going to have a say in this. It’s not like the Bengals are going to say you must get surgery. If he wants to try to play with it, they’ll let him try, I suspect. But it’s not going to be easy. And he may just decide, screw it. We got to do what we have to do. Because the sooner I do it, the sooner I come back and I’m good to go and we can finish strong. Three months that gets us into December. The season’s not over. There’s still a few weeks left. Jake Browning, if he can win enough games, they may be in striking distance. But this is the third significant injury for Joe Burrow in his career. He had the torn ACL as a rookie. Then in 2023, he had the wrist where remember there was the video of him with the sleeve and oh why isn’t he on the injury report and then that night there went the wrist and last year he was physically fine. The team wasn’t. So there we go. Big blow. There we go. Jake Browning is one of the better backups in football. We saw that. But he’s not joking. Four and three as a starter, right? throws three interceptions yesterday and they still find a way to win the football game because of Jacksonville dumb crap they did. Okay, and let me just continue down my line of dumb Jacksonville crap. Liam Con woke up this morning in a sweat. I can promise you going, “Oh my god, I can’t believe we lost that game.” I’m sure he’s had to punch his pillow or take some stress out some way. So, I hope he has a stress ball as he’s driving into work where he can just grab it and do it because here they are up 14 to7. Here’s another mistake I’m going to throw into you. Trevor Lawrence throws two interceptions on the day. We showed the first one. The second one was not his fault. Brian Thomas Jr. alligator armed a ball down the middle with a defender not very close to him. He did throw him into two guys. There were two guys there. I’m always reluctant to accuse someone of alligator arm. I got you. I got you. But there were two guys coming right at him. I mean, it was kind of a little hospital ball. was going to catch it there. It wasn’t like bang bang though. He was going to catch it and be able to get his feet on the ground and do that. It was a little too alligator arm. Either way, it’s 14-7 now. It goes to 14-10 with the interception. The Jags drive down the field. They do some good things. Trevor Lawrence tried to throw another interception that was bad. Okay, that got overturned because Gina Stone dropped it. But then after that, if you remember, this is the same drive. Jags up 14-10. Trevor Lawrence rolls out to the left on a third and 10. He can run for the first down and he throws the ball five yards past the line of scrimmage to where that’s where sometimes and was arguing afterward like did you not realize I said I said his Madden awareness rating has now plummeted defensively. That was very funny when you said that. I mean, how can you not know you’re a quarterback? How do you not know you’re five yards past the line of scrimmage and then you’re arguing with them about it? I’m I’m with you. So that there there’s another moment in the football game right there where you go, “Oh, wow. They should be up more, but now it’s only 17 to 10.” Because again, if he just runs, it’s going to be first down and goal. And you know, yeah, I’d like to like to think they score, but then as we go into the game, of course, there’s other opportunities. Now, they’ve let Cincinnati hang around and Jake Browning starting to get into a groove. Yeah, he makes a few more mistakes certainly, but then we get into later in the football game here and now it’s 24-24 later in the game. Miraculously, it’s 24-24 even though the Bengals have thrown three interceptions and Joe Burrow’s not in the freaking game. It’s incredible. We get down there close to the red zone. They have a a second down pass and I think we got the play, guys, with Here it is. Second and goal play action. This is your chance. Take over the game. God. Right through Deami Brown’s hands, who’s been very good here through two weeks. But this has got to be caught in this moment. Drop the pass there. Have to settle for a field goal. Now it’s 2724 instead of 3124. And having the pressure on Jake Browning to go, hey, you’re going to have to go down the field, score a touchdown. And then we have off of that the crucial crucial analytics, baby. Right. 2724 Jags late in the game or later in the game here. They’re to decide to go for it on fourth and five. I can’t disagree with this decision more. It’s fourth and five. You’re up three. There’s three minutes and 43 seconds. Liam Conn makes a comment that it’s 100% the analytics say go 100%. I I I don’t you know, again, this is where the numbers, you know, coaches only seem to use numbers when it benefits them in an argument. And then other times they’re just like, well, there’s all these other elements that went into it and I I just don’t agree with this call. You go up by six, you put the pressure on the Bengals with a backup quarterback, right? To go down and have the the the pressure of a touchdown. Now, people are going to go in defense go what? Well, they scored a touchdown. Well, let me explain. Context matters. All right. In the world, we lose context a lot. If you’re a quarterback and you know you only have to go down and kick a field goal, there is so much less pressure for what we just talked about with the Cowboys a minute ago. They have a good kicker. They like, we just get around. He’s a guy that made 70 in the preseason. Exactly. We just get around midfield. We’ll be okay. Okay. Now you get past midfield. You’re in field goal range. There is no more pressure on the offense. Everything goes back to the defense now cuz now they’re holding on for dear life going, “Wait, they got the field goal to tie the game. We got to stop them from scoring a touchdown.” And within that, of course, they get down the field, they get down close to the red zone. I think Jacksonville should have let him score instead of trying to play tough defense and let the clock run out. And of course, they ultimately score and go up four points and win the game. And just too many blunders for me for Jacksonville, the analytics stuff. And here’s what happens. Because the teams now all have Yeah. analytics departments. And as your buddy Lombo said when he was throwing darts at NFL teams when no NFL team wanted his buddy Bill Bich, so we act like we don’t want them. He did take a shot at Tony Khan. Yeah. indirectly. There are teams where the owner’s son runs the analytics department. Well, if Tony Khan runs the analytics department, if you’re Liam Cohen, you better do what the analytics are telling you to do. So, a lot of this when the coaches come out and defend it, they know that’s their safe harbor because they’re doing the thing. You know, it used to be if you did the conventional thing from the perspective of the fans, that was your safe harbor. Now the safe harbor is to do the thing that the mathematics experts in the building who have the ear of the owner yes are expecting you to do so who don’t know football all that well but they just know numbers and there’s a formula for that go for their way to act like they know the owners and the GM know now because we have numbers and it’s just not that way every time we point out yeah but you had Jake Browning not Joe Burl Well, that’s factored into the formula. Okay. It’s a It’s a formula based on thousands of iterations in the same down and distance with the same amount of time, right? And if you have the luxury of doing it thousands of times, okay, we’re going to get a little incremental bump, but you know what? If you’re Liam Colin, you ain’t going to be there. Unless of course you’re doing what Tony Khan’s analytics department tells you to do because then it’s not your failure. If you say I’m not doing what you wanted me to do and we lose, then it’s easy for the analytics department to say if you had just done what we had told you to do, we would have won the game because the analytics say this is what we need to do. It’s the analytics. That’s what the coaches are scared of. That right there. Shove it up your analytics. Yeah. Yeah. I’m with you. So So you And you’re right, too, like what are you doing with your timeouts? What are you doing not trying to preserve your ability to go down the field because the Jaguars are moving the ball? Exactly. Right. Look at what the Cowboys did with 19 seconds left. And that Well, they would have needed a touchdown. That’s the thing. Because the Bengals went up by four to cover the three and a half point spread. It’s incredible. My best bet. I mean, all of it. It just And not only should they have won the game, they should have covered it. I mean, it just is unbelievable. I’m cursed early in the season. How about the tush push that the Bengals used, too? And I talked to Browning after the game. Okay. He’s never practiced that play. And I I said to him, I mean, it really wasn’t the tush puss. It’s like throw your kid into the pool. Yeah. That was more quarterback sneaking. He lift him up. He lifted him up and threw dirty. It was dirty dancing. Unbelievable. Yeah. And he did have the time of his life. And he said he said, “Hey, I don’t squat 500 lb like Jaylen Hurt, so I need all the help I can.” Yeah. Yeah. Well, they that’s what I mean. Nobody can do it like the Eagles can do it. They’re just a different animal that way. I got to give we got to we we you know we we got on Jacksonville there. We got to give Cincinnati a lot of credit. First off, Jake Browning, when you throw two interceptions as a quarterback, it’s hard to throw the ball and be aggressive, especially when you’re a guy that’s not a starter and got a lot of pelts on the horse or the wall or whatever and you’re going, “Wait, I don’t want to be the reason to lose the game.” So, the fact that he stayed aggressive and still made plays and led them to 21 points in the second half, give him a lot of credit for that. The other thing we got to talk about with them is just we got to talk about Jamar Chase a little bit because Jamar Chase is incredible. He continues to be the best receiver in football. And it’s just it was not bombs away or crazy sexy yesterday. It was just like 10 here, 15 here, 20 here, 10 here, eight here. I mean, he is amazing. For my money, yeah, you know, you give me one pick at receiver, I’m taking Jamar Chase all freaking day in the NFL. for 165 after two for 27 I think week one. So, and Jake Browning got him the ball. Joe Burrow got him the ball. He’s just the guy that you count on. And hey, it’s going to be Justin Jefferson and Jamar Chase next weekend in Minnesota. And that’ll be personal. Justin, yeah, something’s missing there. He had a couple of drops last week and you know, Justin’s my guy, but he he he would acknowledge something’s off. Hi, it’s Mike Florio. Thanks for watching PFT on YouTube. Hit subscribe for the latest news and analysis from Pro Football

Chris Simms explains to Mike Florio why the Jaguars were the “better team” despite falling to the Bengals in Week 2, where Cincinnati just barely escaped with a win despite Jacksonville’s “many blunders.” #NFL #ProFootballTalk #CincinnatiBengals #JoeBurrow
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Bengals have been ‘outplayed’ despite 2-0 record to begin season | Pro Football Talk | NFL on NBC
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