CINCINNATI (WKRC) – Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow is 1-9 as a starter in the first two games of his first five seasons, but each of those seasons came with mitigating circumstances. This season there are none, which means there can be no excuse for either him or the offense to not get off to a fast start.
The Bengals open the season this Sunday at the Cleveland Browns.
Burrow’s rookie season came during the COVID-19 pandemic, and he would have won his first-ever start if not for wide receiver A.J. Green getting called for offensive pass interference to wipe out a go-ahead touchdown with seven seconds left, and then kicker Randy Bullock cramping up as he attempted to kick a 31-yard field goal on the next play to try and force overtime, only to miss it.
An appendectomy just as training camp started in 2022 left him physically compromised heading into the regular season, and he threw a career-high four interceptions in a 23-20 overtime loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers.
During training camp in 2023 he suffered a right calf injury that lingered into the start of the regular season, which was a major reason the team started 1-3.
Heading into the 2024 regular season opener there were still concerns about his surgically-repaired right wrist, which was a major reason why he passed for only 164 yards despite completing 21 of 29 passes in a 16-10 loss to the New England Patriots. It also didn’t help that wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase ended his “hold-in” in the hours leading up to kickoff after missing all of training camp.
This year Burrow had a healthy offseason and training camp, had his full array of weapons to work with in camp, and even played five series in the preseason, leading the offense to four touchdowns.
“I think I’m in a good spot,” said Burrow. “I think I’ve been consistent with my routine, keeping my body right, so just got to maintain that throughout the whole year. This is just the start.”
Offensive coordinator Dan Pitcher said having all hands on deck for the majority of training camp should lead to better early season results.
“Every single training camp you’re going to have some days that don’t look the way you want it to look, but it’s helpful when you get those things out of the way in late July and early August and you’re steadily able to build to a place where you know you need to perform at a high level when it counts.” said Pitcher. “We had a chance to do that this year more so than we have in any other years. Any of these previous years, there’s obviously been mitigating circumstances that have gotten in the way of that. This year we didn’t have those circumstances, to a large degree, so I feel good about being able to troubleshoot and maybe solve some problems during training camp.”
Head coach Zac Taylor is 1-11 in the first two games of his first six seasons as head coach and decided to make some changes in training camp by holding morning practices rather than afternoon practices, and in his decision to play his starters in the preseason.
“Camp felt very different this year, just from a day-to-day operational standpoint – how we structured when we practiced; how meetings went,” said Pitcher. “That was refreshing. It had its benefits and its challenges, but it definitely was not the same. We got five series of football in us – real preseason football – which is four more than last year and five more than the prior years. There were things that we needed to clean up from our time out there, but feel good about a lot of what happened. The way we structured things in training camp, how much our guys played on top of some other things were the differences.”
It should also help that the Bengals got a full training camp with the key players on offense who have been together since 2021 – Burrow, Chase and wide receiver Tee Higgins. Running back Chase Brown is beginning his first full season as the starting running back, but he was excellent in the eight games he started last season, while tight end Mike Gesicki is also back for his second season and wide receiver Andrei Iosivas is in his second season as the No 3 wide receiver. Veteran tight end Noah Fant was added early in training camp and has picked things up quickly.
“The continuity helps, because there are just tweaks we are able to make, and the ability to do that without the fear of overloading the guys or having certain guys not understand what we’re trying to get done,” said Pitcher. “Obviously there are new pieces every year, so you have to integrate those new pieces and part of our evaluation process when we bring these guys in is can these guys exist in our universe? Are they capable? We believe that with all the guys that we’ve added. I just think the ability to adjust and really access the entire offense that’s what Joe is going to do. It’s rising tides are going to raise all boats kind of a thing. You have to be at his level, because that’s how he is going to operate and we are not slowing him down. The guys understand that and so I think we’re in a good spot.”
This will be Burrow’s sixth season operating in a system and with coaches he is familiar.
“I feel like I’ve seen just about every look that you can get with all of our different plays,” said Burrow. “Anytime you are in the same system for that many years you know all the ins and outs, the weaknesses of each play and the plays you can get to to attack whatever you are seeing, so I feel like I’ve just seen a lot of different things in a lot of different situations and can adapt accordingly.”
The main question marks are at the two starting guard spots with left guard Dylan Fairchild being a rookie and right guard Lucas Patrick having a shaky preseason performance.
“I have a lot of confidence in that group,” said Burrow. “We’ve got to go out and prove it. We can talk about all these different things in here and how many good players we have and how many good coaches we have, but we have to go prove it on Sundays. Doesn’t mean anything if you have a great training camp team. That’s not what we’re getting paid for. We’re getting paid to win football games and be productive and to play great Sundays. We have to go prove it.”
There’s no excuse this season not to starting in Game 1.