Bengals Beat: After ‘Sitting’ In A Mess They Made in Minnesota, Rudderless Bengals Need Answers Fast

MINNEAPOLIS — Never did one regular season loss feel so ugly or damning on a franchise.

The Bengals, who started the season 2-0 but lost their franchise quarterback a week prior, suffered their worst margin of loss in franchise history. They looked like a team woefully unprepared to handle the rigors of the NFL. Their offensive roster, built to put up video game numbers, has shriveled into a shell that can’t block, can’t run and can’t score.

Oh yeah, they can’t hang onto the ball either.

They fumbled five times Sunday and lost three of them. Jake Browning, Joe Burrow’s replacement for the foreseeable future, threw two more interceptions, giving him five in just over six quarters of play. The Bengals trailed 48-3 at one point Sunday. They had never trailed by 45 points ever in a single game. Ever.

The Bengals locker room after Sunday’s 48-10 humiliation at the hands of the Vikings was a shell-shocked den of embarrassment. Zac Taylor pinned everything on the five turnovers. And obviously, the last minute, 47 seconds of the first half was a big part of the story Sunday, as three turnovers on four offensive snaps led to 17 points and a 34-3 halftime hole.

They look like a team without direction or a clue. Are they a passing team? They targeted Ja’Marr Chase six times and Tee Higgins twice in a game they trailed by double digits for most of it. Are they a running team with Joe Burrow out? Fifty-three yards on 21 carries would hardly support that. They look like a team that can barely execute the most fundamental offensive play at this point.

From the moment they allowed the Vikings to march down the field in two minutes to open the game, to the three-and-out immediately following, the Bengals were outclassed and looked totally unmotivated to play the first full game without Burrow.

It is just one game and the Bengals could manage to rebound against the Broncos in Denver on Monday night and the narrative will very quickly shift. But Sunday, the Bengals looked like a team that didn’t want to be on the field with a Vikings squad that was also starting a backup quarterback and was coming off a 22-6 loss seven days prior against the Falcons.

What’s wrong with the Burrowless Bengals? Well, it started when they had Burrow healthy for the first five quarters of the season.

They can’t run the ball.

They can’t pass protect in obvious passing situations.

The star weapons they signed and spent $250 million on aren’t getting the ball.

The worst part of the Bengals right now is they don’t look like they can block, pass or decide what they want to be on offense.

In short, the Bengals offensive line is getting pushed around like rag dolls and because of it, Chase Brown leads the most anemic run game in the National Football League. Coming into Sunday, the Bengals averaged just 47 yards a game on the ground. How did they respond Sunday? They ran it 21 times for 53 yards. Sure, the score dictated some of that in the second half. But when you’re averaging 2.5 yards every time you run it, teams have no reason to fear you and they’re just going to pin their ears back and attack the quarterback.

Most damning? The Vikings gave up 167 yards a game on the ground over the first two games. They gave up 53 to the impotent Bengals Sunday. The Bengals are getting little to no push up front.

“This is a collective effort. I didn’t see the line have one turnover today. Okay? I saw a bunch of other guys have five,” head coach Zac Taylor told me after. “I didn’t see one of those from the linemen. So very clearly, this is on the entire team, that first half, the offense really struggled. We did not put our team in a great spot and it’s as simple as that.”

Burrow and Jake Browning have looked incredibly uncomfortable in the pocket for a team built to pass the ball. The Bengals are nothing more than a finesse team that’s been punched in the mouth over the first three games and have had precious few answers. If it weren’t for a rookie kicker missing two kicks inside his 40 and another rookie (Travis Hunter) committing a pass interference on Andrei Iosivas on fourth down, the Bengals would be starting 0-3 in the face for a second straight season with no Burrow to bail them out.

Are the answers for all of this on the current roster? One has to seriously wonder if not doubt it. The Bengals three years ago looked like a team ready to rise for the long run. Sunday, they looked like they were free-falling into the abyss that their fan base fears is coming again like a solar eclipse.

The first two wins felt like a mirage on Sunday and if Zac Taylor and his offensive staff can’t find a way to kick start the run game and win at the point of attack going forward, they are headed for a desert of despair and Joe Burrow won’t have to worry about returning in three months.

“I think you got to sit in it. We got worked today, and you got to sit in it,” Browning said. “You got to go through those emotions of like, just being miserable, and then you got to watch the tape and find your key things that you need to focus on for me to do my part and making sure that we move the ball better on offense and don’t turn the ball over and get some points up on the board. And so yeah, it’s kind of the same process whether you win or lose, but obviously it’s just much more painful when you lose, especially the way we did.”

Just three weeks into the season and the Bengals already face a critical crossroads. Whatever path the Bengals wind up choosing, they better show more determination and execution than they did on Sunday or they move closer to confirming the thought that this organization doesn’t know how to build a winner.