You may not have known it, but the Cincinnati Bengals ended up with one of the most efficient rushing attacks in the NFL in 2025.
Cincinnati finished the year fourth in rush success rate and fifth in EPA per rush. The volume in terms of total carries and yards weren’t there due to trailing on the scoreboard for most of the season, but when they could run, the Bengals were able to get the yards they needed down the stretch.
Chase Brown, rightfully, gets credit for that. He’s the lead running back of the offense and just posted his first-career 1,000-yard season. He’s taken strides as an all-around back and is hoping to be the long-term answer at the position in Cincinnati. When the run game looks good, the guy carrying the rock gets the shine.
He’ll also be the first to tell you the catalyst for all of that is the man in the center of the offensive line.
Advertisement
Chase Brown credits Ted Karras for steering Bengals’ run game in the right direction
There isn’t an RB who doesn’t directly benefit from his o-line paving holes for him to scurry through. Brown watched the starting five in front of him evolve into a cohesive unit as the year progressed.
Brown points to center Ted Karras as the biggest reason why.
“I think Ted’s leadership really showed up in a way that you wouldn’t really expect,” Brown told Cincy Jungle’s Anthony Cosenza and I. “Like, the o-line and the communication is huge, so I think what we did really well, and what Ted did really well between everybody was we all knew what we wanted to achieve. Whether in the run game, the pass game, whatever ID he was making, or whatever run game call he was making, everybody knew what we needed to achieve to make that play successful, whether it was in pass or run. So I think we took a really big step there, and you saw that in the second half of the season, for sure.”
View the original article to see embedded media.
Karras wears a captain’s patch on his No. 64 jersey for a reason. He’s the glue that keeps the line together from the literal middle of it. He may not always have the toughest blocking assignments physically, but his work getting everyone on the sam page was evidently wonderful.
It’s also not going away in 2026, thanks to a wise decision Cincinnati made right before last season began.
Advertisement
Bengals look a lot smarter for extending Karras’ contract
The Bengals needed to overhaul their o-line in 2022 if they wanted to get back to a Super Bowl with Joe Burrow. Karras was one of three free-agent signings the club made that offseason, and he signed on for three years. His original deal was set to expire at the end of 2024, and a revised two-year deal extended him into 2025.
Cincinnati wanted him even longer, and gave him another one-year, $5 million extension right before the 2025 season began.
It was a somewhat surprising decision given Karras is 32 years old, but the Bengals put more belief in one of their mist important leaders. Brown’s praise is a clear testament as to where that belief stems from.
Brown and Karras, now both entering contract years, will be the center of Cincy’s rushing attack again in 2026, looking to keep building off what they started.
window.addEventListener(‘message’, function (event) {if (event.data.totalpoll && event.data.totalpoll.action === ‘resizeHeight’) {document.querySelector(‘#totalpoll-iframe-359’).height = event.data.totalpoll.value;}}, false);document.querySelector(‘#totalpoll-iframe-359’).contentWindow.postMessage({totalpoll: {action: ‘requestHeight’}}, ‘*’);
This story was originally published by A to Z Sports on Jan 29, 2026, where it first appeared in the NFL section. Add A to Z Sports as a Preferred Source by clicking here.