As the great leader Michael Corleone once said, “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in…” The Godfather speaks for all of us after Thanksgiving night’s anti-turkey of a performance by the Bengals in Baltimore, a stunning 32-14 rout of the Ravens that broke all manner of precedent, restored hope for another longshot run from deep in the peloton to the postseason, and had a happy Joe Burrow thinking about how to box up all the postgame fixings on offer and send them to the food insecure rather than eat it himself.
Yes, Joey B is back, and all is right with the world. With him under center no dream is too big, even one that imagines the bedraggled and downtrodden Bengals winning their last half-dozen games and stealing the AFC North title.
It wasn’t just the stench of the last couple of months that was working against the Bengals. Thursday night they sailed upwind against numerous trends, including the terrible record for AFC North teams playing road division games on Thursday nights (2-18 all-time, with 10 consecutive losses). Lamar Jackson owned the Bengals, of course, sporting a 10-1 record as a starter. John Harbaugh has been unstoppable in prime time home games, with a 22-4 record. And, of course, the Ravens were owners of a five-game win streak and rocketing toward their presumed spot as division leaders.
None of it mattered, because Burrow Is Back. It wasn’t his finest game by any stretch, but given his 10-week absence he sure looked good, throwing for 261 yards and two touchdowns. There wasn’t any tiptoeing back into the pool—Joe cannonballed right in to the deep end with 32 pass attempts in the first half, more than any QB this season (and the second-most he’s ever thrown). Red zone issues held the team back, as we saw, and Burrow had most of his misfires (2-for-18) down deep. With no Tee Higgins and some rusty timing, that isn’t too surprising, and it all should improve with reps.
Most importantly, Burrow didn’t turn the ball over. He left that to Lamar and the Ravens, who coughed it up five—count ’em, five—times. I etch this too in Joe’s ledger. Burrow has played 2.5 games this season, counting the first half vs. Jacksonville when he injured his toe late in the second quarter. In those 10 quarters, the Bengals have nine takeaways. In the other 38 quarters with Jake Browning and Joe Flacco at the helm, Cincinnati forced just six turnovers. OK, OK, far be it for this analytics guy to ascribe magical mojo to Burrow and credit him for the punching-bag defense turning into warriors merely due to his presence, but I don’t discount it either.
There was some luck involved in the turnovers, but then luck is something the Bengals have had a paucity of all year. Jackson has been playing while banged up, lately with a toe injury of his own, and he was the one who looked like he needed the week off, not Burrow. LJ was tentative, jumpy, erratic—all things he seldom is when playing the Bengals.
Give Al Golden some rare credit for the game plan that saw the Bengals blitz the bejesus out of Lamar. He had by far his best effort as defensive coordinator, and it appears some of his teachings are, at long last, penetrating the helmets of his young defenders. Myles Murphy actually looks like a keeper, Geno Stone wants to tackle, Joseph Ossai is playing like it’s the 2021 preseason, and the rookie linebackers, well, are still a bit lost, but at least there are a few good plays mixed in. Jordan Battle made perhaps the game’s biggest play, chasing down Isaiah Likely and punching the ball loose for a touchback. Rather than trail 14-6, Cincinnati remained down a point and drove to take a lead they never relinquished.
Cincy’s D, you will be happy to know, is no longer the worst of the DVOA Era. The stuffing of Baltimore on Thanksgiving leaps them up to fourth-worst all-time after 12 games. They are still the worst in 2025 by a considerable margin but are only second-worst against the run and the pass, thanks to the Jets (worst against the pass) and the Giants (worst against the run).
Next up is another road game that looks foreboding but, like the Ravens encounter, may not be so frightful upon closer examination. The Bengals travel to Buffalo on Sunday afternoon, the kickoff now at 1 p.m. after being flexed out from the 4:25 window several weeks ago. (The NFL passed on featuring a Burrow vs. Josh Allen matchup, that’s how bad the Bengals were.)
The up-and-down Bills pummeled Pittsburgh with their run game last week, evoking memories of a fabled game by a pre-pariah O.J. Simpson running wild against the Steel Curtain, much to the shock of their fans. The Bills and the Bengals are mirror images of late, with powerful running games and equally limp rush defenses. The Bills have the second-best run offense and the 30th-ranked run defense by DVOA (Cincinnati’s run offense is seventh). Snow flurries are in the forecast for Buffalo, evoking memories of the last time the Bengals came to town and rolled the Bills in the white stuff. Whichever team can a) exert its will on the ground better then the other and b) offset that with some key plays and avoid mistakes will likely emerge as the winner.
For the Bengals, a loss would mean virtual elimination from the playoffs. The amazing thing is that, just like last year, the team remains alive despite a gross first three months. Should Burrow lead another late-season win streak (and he’s won his last eight starts, counting the Jags game that he left early), the Bengals could actually steal the division title. There is a long way to go, to be sure, and for the record the playoff odds at FTN Fantasy remain incredibly long—just 6.6%, up a tick from last week but hardly a good bet.
But this is where the Bengals, Zac Taylor, and Burrow shine: Late season runs in defiance of all that’s come before it. Taylor is 23-8 in December/January, the far more important counterfactual to the oft-repeated “slow start” records we repeated to death all summer. They’ll need help from the Ravens and Steelers along the way, but that too feels possible, given how Baltimore has looked this season and how Pittsburgh fans are reduced to booing Renegade and chanting for Mike Tomlin’s firing.
Like you, I’m not that optimistic, but Burrow’s return makes anything possible. And the fact we have something to dream about at this point in this insane season is simply astounding—like Burrow himself.
Robert Weintraub heads up Bengals coverage for Cincinnati Magazine and has written for The New York Times, Grantland, Slate, and Deadspin. He guests on Mo Egger’s radio show every Thursday in the 4 p.m. hour. Follow him on X at @robwein.