Bengals Beat: With Barrett Carter ‘Cutting it Loose’ In The Middle, Al Golden’s Defense ‘Populating The Ball’, Headed In Right Direction

CINCINNATI — It may have taken 13 weeks, but the Bengals defense is finally playing up to expectations for defensive coordinator Al Golden.

Golden, who set a “Santa Clara standard” early in training camp, has been waiting for his young players to finally arrive and make big plays at big moments and swarm to the ball.

On Thursday in Baltimore, he finally saw that on two plays that could’ve been catastrophic. In the second quarter, Lamar Jackson hit tight end Isaiah Likely on a deep crosser and Jordan Battle lost contain and allowed his man to get away for what appeared to be a certain touchdown that would’ve made it 14-6 Baltimore. Instead, Battle raced from behind and punched the ball free and it rolled out of the end zone for a touchback.

Then, on the last play of the third quarter, Jackson hit Derrick Henry on a short pass that turned into a 44-yard play. But it was defensive end Myles Murphy who chased Henry down from behind and brought him to the ground. Five plays later, Murphy got huge push into Jackson’s face and that push resulted in a Jackson interception by Demetrius Knight Jr. If it weren’t for the Murphy tackle from behind, the interception may never have happened.

“Just really great effort plays. We populated the ball really well, and we made a lot of our breaks. Meaning, (Jordan) Battle could have given up on his play. He hustles and finishes it. Myles Murphy makes a tackle way downfield, and five plays later, he bats the ball and we intercept that one. So the guys, they played hard. They played collectively, and I just thought they competed and responded really well.”

The Bengals suffered through some hideous stretches – like the Jets and Bears games back-to-back – but is this the light at the end of the tunnel? Defenders swarming to the ball, defensive linemen getting push up field, keeping gap integrity, allowing the corner backs to plaster and stay on their receivers, all the characteristics of a play-making defense.

There was the 28-yard touchdown run by Henry in the first quarter where at least three Bengals were outside the numbers and Henry cut back inside and basically ran untouched to the end zone.

“I just thought they got around the ball really well. We think we overran the first run. We had too many guys outside the point, and we had a couple chances on the backside, and but other than that, I thought we swarmed to the ball really well, and we set good edges and we didn’t make it so that we were dealing with five things. It was just a couple things that we were dealing with, which is really good.”

In the last three weeks, the Bengals’ defense has allowed 20 points to the Steelers, 19 to the Patriots and 14 to the Ravens. That is a trend – if it continues – could allow Joe Burrow and the offense to carry the Bengals on a winning streak they need to make a run at the AFC North.

“I just think it’s a great group to work with,” Golden said. “They’re learning, they’re growing. Obviously, after the bye week that the two linebackers settled in, we’ve been given them more over the last three games, more to handle at the line of scrimmage, and they’ve responded. And so we’ve, we’ve performed better versus the run game, the games are easier to call right now. They’re we’re obviously making more plays, giving us more get get back on track downs, more pass rush downs. We’re tackling better. We’re disrupting the football better. So we just got to keep going.”

This week, the Bengals are facing another quarterback that can kill with arm and legs, in defending NFL MVP Josh Allen. It’s all about contain, contain, contain. With linebackers Carter and Knight playing faster and without hesitation, the Bengals now feel they have a chance in the middle of the field to make plays. The difference? Time spent during the bye week after the two hideous games to better understand what they were doing wrong and what to do to make it better.

“I think that’s been the biggest thing. I think they really settled in,” Golden said. “I think the bye week came at a good time for them, but they settled in at that point. And like I said, the last over the last month, we’ve been giving them more, and they’ve handled it, handled it really well. I thought Barrett played really well the other night. It was one unfortunate missed tackle, which we have to clean up, just his angle there and just knowing he has help outside and not overrunning it. But I thought his command was really good. And there was a couple of times where he had to make a check on his own and get it right, and get it communicated across the board. And he did that.”

Carter has been playing with the play-calling green dot on his helmet for five weeks now, ever since replacing Logan Wilson as starting middle linebacker with the Jets game. The Bengals hope the growing pains are in the past and now they start to realize the potential that made him their fourth-round pick in last April’s draft. Carter had a game-high 16 tackles in the loss to the Patriots and eight more in the 32-14 win over Baltimore.

“Just a lot of attention to detail,” Carter told me. “We know that we weren’t playing we weren’t playing good, and we know that we worked way too hard for the results to look like how it did. So we shot to really just be intentional every single day, in practice, in the meeting room, in the film room, just all of it. Everyone just try to do your 1/11 to the best of your ability. So yeah, we know that we weren’t playing like we should have been playing. So we just had to be more intentional with everything.

“I think we’re playing more confident, just knowing that we have the ability to put good stuff on tape and try to eliminate (bad) plays from games and but just we work our butts off every single day. When you’re confident, you do play faster. So I’ll say, yeah, I think we are playing faster. I think we’ve attacked within with a different type of confidence recently, and we should need to keep building on that.”

“His command of the position. It’s a vocal position. To have the green dot and be able to communicate like he has and just continues to progress,” head coach Zac Taylor said. “He’s just continuing to learn, and that’s what he’s done.”

Carter and Knight are the heart of the Bengals defense. They are waiting for Shemar Stewart to return from injured reserve and join in. If the Bengals could get Stewart and Trey Hendrickson back, their defense could be transformed almost immediately. But for now, Golden has no choice but to wait on players like Carter and Knight to continue to grow.

“That’s been Al’s message to us a whole year: He wants our game plan to be super calm and just super quiet for us,” Carter added. “So when it comes game time, we can go out there and just cut it loose now. Don’t think about anything. Just play the sport that you’ve been playing your whole life and that you’ve grew up loving. So our coaches do a great job of that, just keeping the game plan quiet for us, and we just have to keep building on it and just keep improving every week.”

NOTES:
Tee Higgins, with his jersey on, took part in Monday afternoon’s walkthrough but remains in concussion protocol. Tahj Brooks also remains in concussion protocol as the two players hope to be back in time for Sunday’s game in Buffalo. Trey Hendrickson continues to battle with a hip/pelvis injury and is doubtful again this week.