Why is Cincinnati Bengals’ Defense THIS BAD? | NFL Film Breakdown

Why is Cincinnati Bengals’ Defense THIS BAD? | NFL Film Breakdown

obvious to everyone that’s watched the Cincinnati Bengals that the defense is a disaster, but we watched the film in detail and Mike Santaga joins me to break down exactly why things are so miserable for the Bengals on defense. You are Locked on Bengals, your daily Cincinnati Bengals podcast, part of the Locked On network, your team every day. What up, Bengals fans, and welcome to another episode of the Locked On Bengals podcast, part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. We continue our trail of misery as we investigate and discuss the Cincinnati Bengals 2025 defense. If you missed yesterday’s show, James and I talked about why it’s one of the worst defenses we have seen, who’s to blame, what conversation should be happening at Payor Stadium. But I’m Jake Liscoco, joined today by Mike’s Santager for our weekly film breakdown. And Mike has dug into the film and we’re going to talk about in detail, excruciating detail. This is not going to necessarily be the most pleasant conversation about the Cincinnati Bengals as we dive into things like why the pass rush isn’t working from an individual perspective, from a stunt perspective and a blitz perspective, where there are issues in coverage, the multiple issues around tackling, which include athleticism, angles, processing, guys not understanding their jobs, not understanding how offenses are trying to attack them. That’s especially true of the defensive front. I would say a lot going wrong with this defense. A lot going right with the Bengals in the running game. We will get to that as the big positive to take away from the Bengals game against the Jets. Had been a good run defense this year. Legitimately a good run defense and the Bengals made them look terrible. There are reasons for that of course which have to do specifically with the big criticism of the offense that we need to discuss today which is that there is no answer or there was no answer against the Jets anyway when they went double double and have double teams of both Jamar Chase and T. Higgins. There’s no wide receiver three in this offense right now with Mike Cassiki’s injury and Andre Yosvash’s level of play this year. Some of that also probably has to do with Joe Flacco’s trust and timing with those down roster receiving options, but that was glaringly obvious for the Bengals in the second half when they couldn’t get it going on offense in the fourth quarter. That will be where we go to finish the show, but we’re starting Mike with the biggest issue facing this team and that is the continued struggles of the defense. And this episode brought to you by Game Time. So, if you’re looking for tickets on Sunday, maybe for something to do beside a Bengals game, you can check out all the events in the Cincinnati area using a promo code lockdown NFL on the Game Time app. You’ll save $20 on your first purchase. But Mike, let’s start with the pass rush. We’ll go front to back on this defense. The pass rush, one of the biggest problems for this team right now, obviously run defense a huge problem as well. But in the passing game against Justin Fields, who has been terrible all year, one of the most pressured quarterbacks, one of the most ineffective quarterbacks this year, just had his best game of the year by a huge margin. And a big part of that was how bad the Bengals were in the pass rush and that has been the case all year. What were the myriad issues in the pass rush that you saw when you watched the tape? I think we could start on an individual level just that nobody wins as a pass rusher. And this was a time where a lot of these guys got their true one-on-one two-way go opportunities and still couldn’t win. Cuz I think that’s been an idea of just like, well, yeah, but you’re giving Trey Hendrickson the two-way go. Like he can go inside. Everybody else kind of has to work off that contain like that defensive tackle’s got to watch. If he goes inside, he’s now the contained guy. The other defensive end, he’s trying to just push the pocket. No tackle. and it well that argument falls apart when those guys get their one-on-one opportunities and they do nothing with them. NASCAR P it doesn’t matter. Whatever they got into didn’t make a difference. Just none of them win as pass rushers. It’s I guess a product of getting so many guys who really weren’t high quality pass rushers in college and think that you could develop them and then the development plan they just don’t have one. there is or if they have one it’s not working. So guys that they’ve brought in Chris Jenkins, Shamar Stewart, it’s one year for him but uh Miles Murphy even you could argue Joseph Osai I guess a third round pick and people had some hopes for him possibly developing into something and he’s developed a little bit. I think you could point to tiny bits of development with some of these guys but nothing has developed into being, oh that guy’s a good pass rusher. That guy’s an average pass rusher. I think most of these guys are playing below replacement level pass rushers that you could go out and sign for vet minimum contracts. Really, you go back through the history for the Cincinnati Bengals and look at their draft history looking for like the last good pass rusher they had. It’s probably Carl Lawson who had a pretty solid pass rush success rate with the Cincinnati Bengals. Didn’t always translate to sacks, but at least he could string moves together. At least he could win. at least he could get the quarterback off his spot. I know Sam Huard the next year in 2018 had 38 sacks in his career, but never was a strength of his game, right? He was a hustle sack, a cleanup sack guy and was productive in that way. Had that high motor, really good run defender, occasionally would flash those pass rush wins and have good clean sacks. But before that, you have to go all the way back to like the Carlos Dunlap, Gino Atkins draft in 2010. It’s not like they haven’t been trying. They’ve spent all these picks on guys that are pass rushers and they just haven’t worked out and they have their type of these big athletic guys and lately that’s really not it for them to the point where you know you talked about Miles Murphy in year three four and a half sacks in his career at this point doesn’t look like there’s any step coming there and in addition to that it’s not like these guys are good run defenders it’s not like there is a Sam Huard out there this like elite run defender average at best pass rusher they just have a bunch of guys that are just kind of okayish at things that aren’t generating pressure, that aren’t holding up in edge defense in the run game and can’t execute even the things that are trying to manufacture pressure. Right. This we’ve talked about the stunts throughout this year for Al Golden’s defense, how slow they are, how uncreative they seem to be, very like draw within the lines, color by numbers, do exactly what you’re told to do on a play, which leads to stuff like Shamar Stewart running himself out of a player. a few weeks ago. Logan Wilson running himself out of a play. Why aren’t the thoughts working, Mike? Yeah, it was interesting you mentioned um Sam Hubard and Carl Car Carlos Dunlap because there’s like this weird thing they had. I think it was in 2019, whatever year Hubard had 10 sacks or something. Dunlap just created five or six of those by being a really good crasher and Hubard was just able to loop around him. They don’t have that right now. If one of these guys was a really good crasher, Murphy or Stewart, I think, is what I look at and just like if that guy could just have the brain to just like love contact to the point that I would love to just go run into that guard and do nothing else this play and free you up for a sack. Carlos Dunlop is able to do that and they’ve had guys do it before, but I think it’s slow like you said. I think they take it feels like they take too many steps. I feel like when I watch other teams run a TE stunt, I I the creativity, you could be uncreative if you’re good at it, but they’re not good at it. But if they I watch another team run a TE stunt, it’s one, two to sell the rush from the end. Tackle then hits the other offensive tackle and he loops around him and just changes direction quickly. Quick burst to get through there. And it’s weird because Steuart and Murphy, if they’ve got burst, they could be that looper and they could be that crasher, but it’s not working. And part of it, I think, is that they’re taking three, four steps to sell the rush. You don’t you shouldn’t have to do all that. Like a lot of NFL offensive lines, Bengals included, at times, they struggle when you put those guys like side by side indicating like one in a five tech, one in a nine, and that should be like red alarm bell, stunt coming, stunt coming. They still struggle to pick it up. And there’s like one step taken by the defensive end to sell it. Yeah. So, you really need that good crash. That guy that just runs in there just screws up the offensive line and the other can go loop around him. And I feel like the loop’s slow. The crash isn’t really hitting guys hard. And when it when it does, it is what you talked about with Logan Wilson and Shamar Stewart. Shamar Stewart crashes into the guard. It’s a screen. He’s chasing the guard down to hit him. It’s a screen. Yeah. And that that’s what I meant by creativity. not as much in the designs, but in the execution, like the awareness that is like, hey, I don’t actually need to do exactly what this thing is like on paper. I can use my brain and be creative and transition into doing what the play actually requires me to do. And that is a a tricky line, especially for young players, like where do I go off of what this is on the whiteboard and freelance a little bit because you can get in trouble obviously if you do that. But there are a couple of stark examples this year when you watch a tape of guys just like running headlong into an offensive lineman instead of actually affecting a play that they have the chance to affect if they just are more aware perhaps of what’s going on. Willing to break off of what was drawn up. We we’ll need to talk about the blitzes, Mike. We need to get to the linebacker play, the angles, the issues with tackling this team has the awareness issues, the processing speed issues that I think exist, communication and coverage. More to talk about as we continue to pick apart this defense that just had a disaster day against one of the worst offenses in the NFL. Coming up next, we’re brought to you today by Mazda on lockdown Bengals and Mazda crafts cars for those who do more than simply move. I personally drive a Mazda. This is a part of the show where I hold my Mazda key up to the camera because I do more than simply move with my Mazda. Mazda delivers confidence with every ride with more IHS top safety pick plus awards than anyone else as of August of this year. From footwork to breath work, athletes sweat, all the details, and Mazda brings that same attention to how they craft every model. You can feel the Japanese craftsmanship in every detail from metallic accents to available Napa leather upholstery. 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It’s less stressful than any other way I’ve bought tickets. So, download the Game Time app today, create an account, and use promo code locked on NFL. You’ll get $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Again, those promo code Loc for $20 off. Swipe, tap, ticket, go. Download Game Time today. Mike, as we continue with this defense, and I’m sorry I warned you guys at the start, this isn’t the the most fun conversation as we’re talking about a litany of things that have gone wrong with at least last week we could talk about the bright spot of DJ Turner and and the takeaways they had and doing just enough DJ Ivy patting down the Hail Mary so you didn’t get another Aaron Rogers Hail Mary. The Bengals managed to win last week. this week against a much worse offense this year. We’re talking about it the way we are because it’s the Jets and and that’s what makes it so hard to stomach for me, Mike. But they blitzed a few more times in this game than normal. It was still, I think, one of the lower blitz percentages Justin Fields has faced this year. And they did manage a couple of disruptions from either showing blitz or bringing a blitz. They got Miles Murphy one-on-one with a running back on one play that led to a Justin Fields incomplete pass to help the Bengals get off the field. They got Cam Taylor Britt free and he actually ran through the quarterback in a way Jordan Battle did not when he was a free runner on a on a similar blitz idea, a DB blitz. What was the issue with the blitzes, Mike? And and why do you think this team is so reluctant to go to that? Well, yeah, it feels like this week was better than others, which is one of the few things that is that they actually did get those matchups. They did get those free runners, but if you look at the totality of the season, I think they’ve done a very poor job at getting free runners on blitzes and sending that extra heat and just it gets picked up. They show blitz and guys don’t fall for it. I think that actually helped them on the Murphy play where they showed Blitz and I think they kind of went like, “Yeah, sure.” And then Murphy’s on a running back and is able to get a pressure and leads to an incomplete pass like you said. Obviously, the Jordan battle thing happened like that. You can’t slow down as you get to the quarterback. It’s not a It’s not a yellow light. You’ve got a green light. Go hit him. Including the preseason this year, we’ve seen Jordan Battle treat a quarterback like he’s got a red jersey on. And uh I mean even Al Golden said you got to run through the quarterback there. Yeah. Because at least you’ll move him off a spot, make him play out of structure. You’re in the red zone, so a lot of the stuff is timed up. You want to move him off his first read. He can’t throw that corner route if there’s if he’s even if he just has to take a step back to get out of the way and then immediately set his feet again to throw it, it’s no longer viable because it it’s just not now that throw isn’t there. It’s such a timing short window throw. I think it’s frustrating to watch schematically a defense that is one not willing to blitz and then when they do blitz like cuz you know everybody I think is thinking at home like send more guys they can’t rush the passer then they send more guys and those are just more guys to get stonewalled at the line of scrimmage. I think that’s the frustrating thing is he just does not feel like Al Golden has his finger on the on these pass protections that off NFL offensive lines are using um against him in these scenarios. So I I don’t know what the answer is cuz blitzing more it was a little bit effective this week but I also I could think of a a 3D three under fire zone and they pick it up like nothing. Fields has a huge pocket on a fiveman rush. Maybe it’s just zeros. You can’t live and die in zero. like that is I guess it’ll be faster. There’ll be points scored or taken away faster by this defense, but it you can’t live in that. Greg Williams, he’s tried. It it hasn’t worked because then you run up running cover zero on a Hail Mary and it gets completed. Everybody’s looking at you like what are we doing? Yeah. What are we doing back there? But maybe you could cut that out just like maybe we don’t blitz in that scenario. But I just don’t think like they’re not a team that like could live in zero either. like the Brian Flores hasn’t lived in zero since he’s moved. They all have more interesting ways to come up with pressure because there’s too many answers to true cover zero. And it depends on the quarterback you’re facing too, the offensive line you’re facing to some degree. They they did get one solid play out of a zero look, I think, in this game, but Justin Fields when he was according to PFF charting, which was 30% of his drop backs, which I think for the Bengals is by far the highest number. Mhm. This year that’s 11 of his 37 drop backs. He was 10 of six. He had a scramble as well. 10 of six, 60% obviously 71 yards, 7.1 yards per attempt and uh his lone touchdown pass of the game, which was the play that we talked about with Jordan Battle where look, maybe if Jordan Battle runs through that one, the game goes totally differently from that point, right? You you get a stop, you uh maybe have a little bit of of a confidence differential, right? that you don’t end up getting. The Bengals get pressure according to PFF on those blitzes on five of the 11 dropbacks. So, of their pressures, they had seven pressures on the game according to PFF. Seven five were on the blitz. So, they didn’t get pressure without blitzing. But like you said, it’s uh it’s tough to live where the only way you can get pressure is blitzing. that’s going to make everything look worse in pass coverage. And we we’ll get to the secondary, the communication obviously not up to snuff. The Dax Hill touchdown that we just talked about on that Jordan Battle Blitz, like yeah, he gets beat, but if there’s the if the Blitz gets home like it’s supposed to get home, he’s maintained inside leverage. He’s forced a harder throw outside, and if the blitz gets there, that timing is off. That throw isn’t there, like you said. So, yeah, Dax does give up the outside, but kind of does his job, right? like he could do better on that play, but if the blitz works, he’s done his job. The Bengals get off the field. Beyond that, there’s this issue with tackling that persists. This is the second straight week where we feel like the Bengals haven’t tackled well and the opponent has missed many more tackles according to PFF charting. Anyway, PFF had the Jets with 17 missed tackles against the Bengals to the Bengals seven. But some of that at least is because of Bengals guys aren’t athletic enough or processing quickly enough to get in position to even attempt to tackle. Other times are getting jked in the hole. There’s a number of plays in this game where Barrett Carter, Demetrius Knight don’t even affect the running back uh in in the hole. They they get that one-on-one in the hole near the line of scrimmage. Should be a three to four yard gain at most. And they got guys just whiffing or bouncing off of running backs. And so you have this angle problem and this tackle technique problem. Mike, what gives? Why can they not tackle now two years running? Yeah, the angle problem I think is more persistent because it also feeds into another thing that they keep going under these blocks on the perimeter and taking themselves out of plays too. And I think it just all leads back to the angle and do these guys have like a thought process in their head of like how fast they are and it’s just not registering with how fast they actually are because a lot of times they take an angle. It’s like yeah maybe maybe prime Thomas Davis could have made that play. It’s the first fast linebacker I could think of. Maybe prime Thomas Davis making that play from that angle. You’re not him. Like you need to take a little bit of a better angle. Understand your speed versus the back speed. stay on the inside hip and work your way down the field and you’re not going to make that stop for a tackle for a loss, but you’ll make the stop. Instead, they take this bad angle. It if they were extremely athletic, maybe they go and make the play, but they’re not. And they’re athletic. They’re not unathletic. They’re not slow. They’re just taking these poor angles for what their speed is because they’re not elite speed. There’s a lot of way lot of area in between those two levels of athleticism. I just remember multiple plays. Demetrius Knight too flat of an angle just thinking I I’m going to go make this play and then he can’t even get a hand on the guy. And that happened with Jordan Battle. That happens. That happened with Barrett Carter. I I think it happens with legitimately everybody who plays at the second and third level of this defense. Just thinking I don’t know what goes through their head, but just like I’m going to go make a play. Maybe it’s that they want to outperform because the defense is struggling to keep its head above water. Maybe they’re trying to reach outside of what their role is to make those plays, but it is a big reason why as fans you leave the game thinking, man, they couldn’t tackle and then like you’re saying, seven charted miss tackles. It’s cuz they didn’t even get in position to make the tackles a lot of those times, which is worse and and translates in so many ways. I think there’s also a processing issue that leads to some of these bad angles where guys are triggering downhill too slow. I think this is especially true of the safeties at times, specifically Jordan Battle. I feel like I notice it every week. But we’ll finish up on the defense here, Mike. We’ll get to the secondary and get to a couple of those topics on the offense that I wanted to get to that there’s something going on in the run game for the Bengals. I know the Steelers have had a tough time on defense, but it’s two games now where the run game has looked really good. They’re they’re finding something there. And we’ll talk about the second half passing game as well when the Jets really made a concerted effort to take away T. Higgins and Jamar Chase to finish the show. Coming up next, I’m Cody Ro from Lock on Broncos and this episode is brought to you by Pelaton. Pelaton is shaping the future of fitness with the brand new Pelaton crossraining tread plus powered by Pelaton IQ. This is Pelaton’s most advanced equipment yet, giving you realtime guidance and endless ways to move. Whether you’re running, lifting, or you’re crossraining with your favorite instructors like Alex Tusant, it’s training reimagined to make your workout more personal, Pelaton is built for breakthroughs. With features that help you plan, stay motivated, and hit peak performance. You can let yourself run, lift, flex, and go, while Pelaton handles all the rest. Plus, Pelaton IQ provides real time strength coaching, tracking your progress, and suggesting weights that challenge you so you can get stronger. Plus the new movement tracking camera. It counts your reps and corrects your form in real time, making sure every rep is safer and smarter. So let yourself run, lift, flex, push, and go. Explore the new Pelaton crossraining tread plus at one pelaton.com. Mike, let’s wrap up on this defense by discussing the secondary. I think there’s a processing issue as well. May maybe we don’t get there today. It’s pretty simple. I think some guys are just not seeing things happening quickly enough, understanding what they’re seeing quickly enough, not triggering to get to where they need to be in the run game quickly enough. And uh that was noticeable to me a couple times, like I said, most noticeable to me with the safeties, but I’m sure that has something to do with the angles we’re seeing at the second level as well, where they’re rookies and the game’s going a little bit fast. And I think that’s true for Shamar Stewart as well, where, you know, you can occasionally see the physical tools, but doesn’t really know exactly what’s happening before it happens. and is reacting a little bit too much. But, uh, in coverage, you mentioned communication in the secondary not good enough this week. And I I think that this could be, you know, green dot changes. Maybe that has something to do with it. It could be confidence waning. Perhaps that has something to do with it. But, uh, where there had been some somewhat steady play from some of the parts of the secondary, it feels like the hinges are kind of coming off the last couple weeks. Yeah, I it feels to me um frustrating at one end and I think the only thing you can look at the secondary that’s playing coverage well is DJ Turner. I think at at this point Dax Hill is almost kind of like the watermark of how this coverage is going cuz when he’s been bad it’s been bad and when he’s been good it’s been good. He was bad this week so the coverage as a whole was also bad. It’s not obviously all on him, but you can point to several plays where the communication is concerned. When you play against mesh and man coverage, you can see Barrett Carter point to one of the under routes. Nobody takes it. Then it’s a 20 yard gain. You can see another play a stick flat on the left side, which is just like a guy stops at six yards and the other guy just goes straight to the flat. Cam to the Britain DJ Turner. either one points to where the other one should go, but they both take the stick route, the little in route, and it’s just so easy. It’s they’re not even making guys work for these completions, I think, is the most frustrating part of when you have communication breakdowns like this and you’re in whatever week you’re almost halfway through the year. It It’s concerning. And it was all true last year. So, is it’s I feel like Luan Rumo got some blame for that last year. a poorly coached unit is going to have bad communication and it’s still true. So, is it just another same issue with the coach or is it’s like some of these players are just poor communicators? I think that’s where you’re getting to. You’ve got Al Golden saying that he doesn’t know how much simpler he can make things on Monday. That’s uh that’s quite a remark to make about your struggling defense. But when you put all these things together just to put a bow on the defense, you have communication issues in the secondary. you have an ineffective pass rush. You have guys that aren’t taking good angles and when they do take angles that get to the running uh to the ball carrier rather. You can’t make the the tackle. You’ve got ends that can’t hold the edge and run defense. And you don’t have, like I said, there’s a passion juice anywhere across the defensive front. You’re not executing stunts. You’re not blitzing much perhaps because Golden doesn’t have the confidence to to ask guys to understand what they need to do on some of those blitzes. talking about how simple he’s trying to keep things on defense and not trying to give guys more than they can handle. You got a bunch of rookies on the field. That’s what leads to one of the worst defenses we have seen the Bengals ever field. Certainly the worst in my opinion through eight games. And it could change that I’ve seen since I was really paying attention to the Bengals. The worst in the Duke Tobin era of the Cincinnati Bengals. And it comes off of a streak where Duke Tobin has spent 10 picks on top 100 players in the draft on the defensive side of the ball. So, a lot going wrong on that defense. When you put all those things together, really easy to understand why. But at least there’s a run game. Uh this is the one thing that’s going marketkedly well for the Bengals in the last two weeks in particular. And the Jets were actually a good run D coming into this week by success rate, by run stuff rate, by all these different metrics that you can look at. And maybe this is just the answer. When teams go double double, which is what the Jets effectively did for the entire second half on Jamar and T, you just beat him with the run game. Sama Perine and Chase Brown both looked excellent. Both forced a bunch of missed tackles. The run blocking had a lot of really, really positive reps. Mike, what’s going right for the Bengals in the run game? I think one, they’re setting it up better. It’s like they’re thinking about it a little bit more. I think we’ve talked about that a lot with Joe Burr at quarterback where it just feels like the run game is such an afterthought and now I don’t know if it’s just like a necessity thing, but they’re putting in tendency breakers that they like when we normally run this tight end motion, we always run right at the tight end. And we talked about that with Joe Burrow and that power play a lot. They’ve run wide zone opposite of that tight end motion three times since then. All three of them have been 10 plus yard gains. Now, obviously, you’re going to you’re now building a tendency that way, too. So, now you need to have, you know, tendency breaker for your tendency breaker. But I look at that, I look at that really interesting way they got to wide zone where the back does that little short motion and he’s in the back field, but he’s like six, seven yards away from the quarterback and they motion him back in and he doesn’t come to a stop. It’s not a shift. It’s a full motion. and snap the ball, hand it off, and Peron gets 10 yards on that play where it’s just like interesting wrinkles and ways to present these pretty simple run concepts. They’re not trying to run anything crazy like they did against the Vikings. I feel like that was throwing stuff at the wall that they hadn’t run all year. Whereas this is like it’s inside zone, it’s wide zone, it’s duo, it’s the same stuff we’ve talked about for four years, five years with this team running the same concepts that they’ve been running and different players up front. Sure. But there’s a reason like this is all to me this is a little bit simpler of what is your, you know, what is your assignment on this play? And they can play fast because of that. So, they’re putting in the wrinkles to get the defense a little bit slower while they continue to play fast because they know their assignments. They can shoot off the ball. Also, Drew Samples play has gotten better, too. I think that has also helped them quite a bit. No doubt. And Noah Fant with a really positive grade, particularly in zone blocking this week from Pro Football Focus. Does that align with your viewing experience? Noah Fant with the 12 personnel stuff with Drew Sample out there. Yeah, I think he’s been better than Grandandy. And I think part of that is because they kind of respect the passing game with Noah Fant more. And you’ve seen all the big play action plays off of it, too. So, I don’t know if he’s like blocking extremely well. Like, he’s not out there pancaking guys left and right and can put together a a John Bates highlight type film, but I think what you’re seeing is he’s keeping the defense even more on their heels where when Grandandy would be in there, I mean, that’s a run. You’re wasting two guys that can’t catch the ball. But you put Fant in there, it’s no longer run and he’s adequate enough, good enough as a blocker to provide you quality sevenperson blocking type of concepts. This week in particular, I thought Amari Smith showed a little bit more than we’ve seen from him in in run blocking as well. Ted Carris, I think, had maybe his best game of the year. Uh we saw Dylan Fairchild get to second level blocks a couple of times. There were if you if you look at each individual player even Orlando Brown if you look at each individual player across and Jaylen Rivers had one play at least that early outside zone play that we were just talking about uh you look at any individual player there there are highlights across the offensive line in the run game this week. So you have that and you have the advantage of if you can go to the run game effectively when teams are double double on T and Jamar great. But then when you need to pass the ball, when teams are going double double on T and Jamar, which is where the Bengals got on that final drive, you need to have an answer beyond those two guys in the receiving game. Noah Fant has been mostly like a screenplay action kind of target in the last couple of weeks, especially in this offense. I wonder if they can get him a little bit more involved with like the straight passing game. He’s like in the flats for the most part on those last couple of plays because he’s check and release kind of pass protection responsibilities. But Andre Yosvage has struggled to separate this year. Has struggled to complete contested catches this year. Has had some drop issues this year. Really been a tough year for him in general. And I I don’t know where else they’re going, but there is not really a good answer after their top two guys right now. And that’s kind of how the game finished, right? Is it was a lot of we’re going to bracket both those good receivers and you’re going to have to find somebody to beat us. And Joe Flacco. Yeah, it it feels like on one hand this is a little bit of a Joe Flacco issue. You could see in the second half of the game where he’s despite the heavy attention Jamar Chase got he’s still every play I’m going to look at him look at him and hang on too long. I think the worst one was the hostage juke second down end of the game. You’ve got the seam because the linebacker doesn’t move when Jamar Chase is running that juke route which is like five yards kind of do whatever you want type route in the middle of the field. Brady loved this with Edelman but when you’ve got two guys on it it’s kind of dead. But that means two guys on him. You’ve got an opening behind it. And that ball ends up behind Yosphas. It should have just been thrown earlier because it went to the same spot earlier. Yosphas can protect himself. There’s no need to throw that to protect him. He catch it and get down or catch it and keep running, but probably get down in that scenario and you get the first down. Also on that play, if he doesn’t look at Jamar Chase at all, and he looks to the left side of the field, the hitch from T. Higgins, I mean, 10 yards of space between him and the and the nearest defender because they just all run with that seam route or they’ve got eyes on Jamar Chase middlefield, but Flaco’s got eyes for Jamar on that play. And I think that was kind of a little bit of the issue throughout where the Jets are going, look, I know you’ll beat us one-on-one, but a true inside outside bracket here. It’s going to be tough for you to win that. And it felt like the Bengals answer to that was Yosvas in these opportunities and he didn’t overcome the nickel court Jarvis Brownley. Jarvis Brownley got the better of him I think in that matchup when it did become those two against each other. I think on the other hand too just a coaching wise thing. Why make it easy for them? I think the hostage juke was the first play that was like, “Okay, so you’re finally not putting them on opposite ends and just having them go, yep, you could bracket both these guys pretty easy if you want to. Like, why not just throw them in a stack, same side of the field? Let’s see you put four defenders, four coverage guys over there, and then how much room they’ll have to work on the other side of the field.” I don’t think they would. So I think that becomes an issue too of just like it didn’t again didn’t feel like they were prepared for a team to actually just run double double an entire half against them because there are a lot of issues like we talked about the run game makes it really easy to run the ball but when they needed to pass they couldn’t because they took away the only high-end Bengals receiving targets that were out there. The guys that Joe Flacco trusts which in this game you’re right like Joe Flacco wasn’t at his best especially in the second half. Uh definitely eyes hanging on Jamar Chase too long. I noticed it early in the game. I thought that it cost the offense a little bit early in the game where he’s just hanging on Jamar a little bit too long or forcing the ball to Jamar in a couple spots. One of them in the red zone where the ball’s late over the middle to Jamar Chase and and brings a linebacker into the play. Ball goes incomplete. T. Higgins in this game, yeah, everybody knows only got two targets. One of them goes for an explosive. That’s great. Uh but also had the lowest usage of T. Higgins in the snap that we’ve seen or in the slot that we’ve seen all year. just 6% of his snaps in the slot in this game. Jamar Chase in there 36% of the time, which is like normal for him. But in the absence of Mike Cassiki, they they do need to figure out where that third option is on this team. Joe Flacco needs to be more comfortable trusting, throwing with anticipation to guys that aren’t just Jamar Chase needs to be more comfortable probably throwing the ball in general to T. Higgins who has overall just like had a relatively quiet year. 360 yards and four catches so far through eight games. That puts him on pace for what about 8 and a half touchdowns which is like a solid year but easy to imagine that that could be better in a full season for T. Higgins would match his productivity last year when he missed games. So, you know, could get more I think out of T. Higgins in this offense like you said and so it’s uh going to be a work in progress there I think at the quarterback spot as well as Joe Flacco is working through a shoulder injury this week anyway according to Zack Taylor on Monday going to be quote unquote dayto-day was sore after the game we all saw the shot he took the the sack he took late in that game and uh we we’ll see how this running game is able to sustain I I think that that’s going to be pretty important if this offense is going to keep it up that’s a big reason they’ve been successful in the last couple of weeks because the passing game while it looks like functional. Now, that’s a lot of a lot of Jamar Chase, which is great. And and that’s going to be this offense, no matter who’s a quarterback, but in terms of consistency, I think they need to find a little bit more in the passing game. And and I know it’s crazy to say that after they just scored 38 points, but but like we’re talking about in the second half, the passing game looked a little defunct. It looked like the Jets kind of figured out how to take it away. The Bengals still managed to score with the run game and the passing game now needs to figure out some answers besides just throwing it to Jamar Chase on every play. As fun as that is when it works. But that’s going to do it for this episode of the Lockdown Bengals podcast. Bengals get the Bears in week nine before the buy. I wonder what the reaction even is if they manage to beat the Bears the last game in the home stand. You can find Mike on Twitter, Bengals Sands. You can hit the thumbs up and follow on YouTube if you’re still here at the end of the show. That means you probably liked what we were talking about or you fell asleep. Uh, hope you’re awake. Uh, but that’s going to do it. You can you can also find Mike’s writing over at bengalalk.com for all of his film breakdowns with some clips if you want to see some of the plays that we’ve talked about. But until next time, thanks for listening to this episode of the Lockdown Bengals podcast and have a good one.

Everyone could tell the Cincinnati Bengals defense is atrocious in their horrible showing against one of the worst offenses in the NFL. Jake Liscow and film analyst Mike Santagata of BengalsTalk.com dissect the Bengals’ defensive woes in detail, from an ineffective pass rush to communication breakdowns in the secondary. We also highlight the bright spots in the Bengals’ run game and offensive challenges when facing double coverage on stars Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins.

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