This thread was inspired by the thread on realistic expectations for 2020. I started writing a comment on that thread, but it got so long that I decided just to start this one.

To forecast 2020, I think we need to

1. diagnose what went wrong or wasn't good enough in 2019,
2. evaluate what the front office and coaches did to address those problems, and
3. base our forecast off of that.

DIAGNOSIS: Defense

On defense, since we couldn't stop anybody, we need to ask why?

Secondary - decent coverage at times, but nobody could tackle. We suffered very weak run support, particularly on the perimeter (remember San Fran & Pittsburgh game 1?)

LBs - enough said. Pratt took awhile to adjust, and everybody else sucked. We gave up hope on Brown and cut him. The best we could bring in was Reynolds and Sheldon. Again,

In combination, the weak tackling by the secondary and the LBs, and the lack of mobility and cover ability by the LBs meant that we got kiledl on perimeter runs and the short - intermediate passing game. We couldn't stop teams from getting first downs.

DLine - As good as they are, as as good as they showed up against Seattle, they went through a spell where they couldn't generate any pressure on the QB. Our poor LB did them no favors, either.

DIAGNOSIS: Offense


Oline - The Oline struggled at the beginning of the year. Especially, on the left (blind) side, and the right side wasn't much better. It got better, but it still wasn't good enough.

WRs - AJ Green didn't play a single snap, and we can't underestimate what his absence meant to this offense. It certainly didn't help our passing game.

QB -As much blame as Dalton gets, he didn't have as much to work with, and he hasn't had as much to work as he did in 2015. That said, even recognizing the various things that haven't helped, I think it's fair to say that his play progressively deteriorated every year since.

TREATMENT: Defense

In response to this, the team cut its weakest tackler in the secondary, Dre K. And cut a guy (Dennard) who was good at what he did (slot corner), but didn't want to do it. We brought in Waynes, who is a much better tackler than Dre, and we brought in Alexander, who is probably as good as Dennard was.

Secondary – We signed Von Bell, who can tackle and cover better than Shawn Williams. As a threesome, Waynes, Alexander, and Bell really improved our ability to defend the perimeter. We'll see how well they can do in coverage. Overall, it's a big improvement in terms of tackling and playmaking.

LBs - We, signed Josh Bynes as a guy who can play the middle at LB, and who is a damn good tackler. In the draft, we basically gave our LB room a total overhaul. Everyone we drafted here can cover, and everyone we draft here can tackle. Logan is a more athletic and mobile LB than alot of people give him credit for, and Davis-Gaither and Bailey are going to strengthen our ability to hold the perimeter.

DLine - All of our LBs will benefit from the signing of DJ Reader. They'll be able to play cleaner, because he eats so many blockers. He should also help us generate more pass rush.

TREATMENT: Offense

OLine, I don't think it's totally fair that we didn't do anything to address the woes of the Oline, Jonah Williams is coming back, people. We haver to consider that as an addition. For al intents and purposes, he was not here in 2019. Xavier S'ua-Filo is an upgrade at guard, and I am cautiously optimistic that Adiniji will surprise some people. So, we have 3 new players, at least two of whom will probably start and play better than the guys who played their position did last year. Also, I think the coaches are praying that the improvement we saw late in the season will continue into 2020.

WRs - We're also getting AJ back, and we added Tee Higgins. Together with Boyd, Ross, and Tate, they make our WR corps one of the top groups in the league. Mixon, Gio, Williams, Anderson, Patrick, Perine, and Whaley are also an impressive group of RBs. I know we'll only keep 3-4 on the roster, and 1 on PS, but it's going to be good competition there.

QB - Finally, we drafted a QB with amazing pocket presence and accuracy, highly advanced processing (pre-snap and post-snap) skills, mobility and play-making ability, and a strong enough arm to have had the best season of any QB in the history of college football. AND he he's a leader who hates to lose.

FORECAST

I think we will see:

1. Better tacking from the secondary
2. Better tackling, mobility, and pass coverage from LBs
3. Improve Dline to stop the run and pressure QBs
4. Improved blocking for pass pro and ground game
5. 2 new WRs who can run routes and offer vertical threat
6. A new QB with better pocket presence, more mobility, greater accuracy in delivering the ball, and who will make better decisions on where the ball should go

If all 6 of those things pan out, I think we will win 10 or more games this year. I won't be disappointed if we don't win the division this year. I think it's easily the toughest division in the NFL right now. Alot of things would have to go right, but I think we could.

I've posted this before, but only 5 of the 31 teams that have gone 2-14 (before the Bengals last season) had a winning season the next year. Only 3 made the playoffs and none won a playoff game. It would be awesome if the Bengals could have a winning record and at least be in playoff contention, but history says that's gonna be difficult. Not impossible, but still a challenge. 

When you look at the last time time the Bengals were 2-14, they also had a pretty damn good off-season (probably the best until this one) and they went 8-8. To me, that would seem to be a fair marker to judge where this team is. If they're around that, and look like they're making substantial progress, I would be satisfied...just like I was with Marvin's crew in 2003.

I'm optimistic, but trying to stay somewhat realistic too. You bring up some good points brother, and if things play out right, this season (assuming there is one) could get real interesting, really quickly. I do think there will be some growing pains though, with all the new faces, the young LBers, figuring out the o-line, fitting the system to Burrow's talents, etc. I could see them getting better and better as the season goes on. Should be incredibly fun to watch play out.

I always look back at the previous season and ask "what would the record be if we had the current team?"

I think we probably would have won the games plus the following (assuming that they were played in the same weeks):

Arizona. With the improved defense and healthy AJ and Jonah, we find a way to win this game.
Jacksonville. They just weren't a very good team last year. Neither were we, but this is a game we win at home.
Raiders. A 17-10 loss that easily should shave been a win.
Steelers. Granted, they were short handed, but this would have been win as well.
Miami.

There's 5 games that very easily could have pushed us to 7-9. Hell, even if we would have just had AJ and Jonah with last years team we probably win those.

Here's the flaw I see. This extensive analysis shows us how we improved upon what we were last year. But we were the worst team in the league last year. Most NFL teams use the offseason to improve their roster (except for teams in cap hell like the Steelers), so just improving upon what you were doesn't by definition translate to more wins. It's more like a margin utility thing - the team that improves more than other teams improve will see an improvement in record, and even then marginally.

With that said, we probably did make a much bigger net improvement than most of our opponents, so we'll be better. But our opponents didn't sit around twiddling thumbs all year. And yes we're getting injured players back, but aren't other teams? And won't we have new injuries this year?

I do think we're on the right track, but my expectations are modest. The AFC North will be brutal, and I think we're looking at a sub-.500 finish and last place in the division again. Maybe if Roethlisberger doesn't come back to full form we'll take third place. But Cleveland's problem last year was bad coaching, and they've addressed that, and Baltimore is going to be unstoppable.

I read somewhere that Burrow had one of the longest time to throw with LSU in his last season. I hope they prepare him to get rid of the ball twice as fast as he did in college. The NFL's pace is way faster than college. Hope he and the coaches are prepared and he can deliver quicker should our O-line turn out to be inferior again.

Burrow if you're reading this, please demand the coaches to give you plays to get rid of the ball quickly.

I agree with your diagnosis for the most part. One thing that needs to change is the Playcalling on Offense and we need
to adapt a scheme that Burrow is comfortable with similar to the one he ran last year. Heard that this is exactly what the
coaches are doing so I am very excited and the FA and the Draft helped out our biggest weakness on Defense at Linebacker,
possibly a strength with adding Bynes, Wilson, ADG and Bailey.

Our ST's was the best in the league last season so we should have the other phase of the 3 solid already at the very least.

(05-05-2020, 09:27 PM)Bengalitis Wrote: I read somewhere that Burrow had one of the longest time to throw with LSU in his last season. I hope they prepare him to get rid of the ball twice as fast as he did in college. The NFL's pace is way faster than college. Hope he and the coaches are prepared and he can deliver quicker should our O-line turn out to be inferior again.

Burrow if you're reading this, please demand the coaches to give you plays to get rid of the ball quickly.

Go read that breakdown on The Medium that was posted here by PyschDoctor. Burrow might not have the fastest release of this year’s QB crop, but his “trigger time” and how quickly he processes was off the charts.

We were better than 2-14 last season unfortunately/fortunately we had a ton of bad breaks that happened to us.
1.) Were getting back AJ Green and we're adding three first RD prospects to our team. Burrow, Williams, and Higgens ( 33rf is basically a first RD pick). That's going to lead to a better offense.
2.) The defense improved drastically from week 11-17 last season. You add Reader, Wilson, and a seasoned Pratt the defense should be significantly better from the get go.

I think this team will surprise a lot of people this season even the Homers.

Dennard wasn't cut he was a free agent and signed with another team.

(05-06-2020, 06:47 AM)motoarch Wrote: Dennard wasn't cut he was a free agent and signed with another team.

That deal fell through. He’s still a FA.

I think our floor is 5 wins and ceiling is 8 wins. And i’m fine with that. I see this as a team that will have success in the coming years, not so much this year. A good year for Burrow, bed in the new defence, and hopefully draft a good o-line man or two next year...and we could become a serious AFC contender.

If this were a normal offseason you could probably bump that up by 1 to 2 wins.

Burrow will have less time to get reps in with his offense. Fortunately he did have extra time to do his prep and study, but he won’t be able to get as many reps in as possible.

Big defensive upheaval. Much needed changes for the better. However, we’ve pretty much got a whole new linebacking corps, most of which are rookies - Bynes will have a big part to play here with his experience.

We do have quite a few solid veterans across the team and we need them to step up this season to help the lads. Green, Atkins, Dunlap particularly. I’m also confident that the coaching staff will be creative enough to provide a useful virtual training camp.

Nice breakdown BoB and I agree with the majority of it. Just how many wins all of it = is just hard to say ? I mostly just wanna see a team that's improving and looking like they belong in the NFL.

Vegas has us at 5 1/2 wins. Having Burrow in place, getting 7 wins, I'd take it. I have some patience where we are at.

I'm excited about the future as well. Burrow has the potential to help make this team amazing. It's going to be exciting to watch him.

I have much lower expectations though. Burrow is a rookie and making the transition to the NFL. That's not to say he won't play well, but there is always a period of adjustment. Again, that's not saying he's going to flop that's just accepting the fact that the odds are against him putting up last year's numbers his first year in the NFL. Also, AJ Green and John Ross are not known for being healthy. While I would love both of them to be healthy for the entire season to help Burrow, I think at least one of them misses time this season. Higgins should hopefully help ease the loss, but he is another rookie that will need a little time to adjust. Everyone's super hyped on Jonah, but he's another question mark. We have no idea what we have in him yet. We don't know that he will for sure be an upgrade. While he should be, it's not a guarantee.

On the defensive side, we have to see how these new players adapt to our system. It's not as simple as just plug and play. Reader has me most excited as he should help eat up blocks, help stuff the run, and allow Geno, Dunlap, and Hubbard to tee off. The LBs are still a question mark. The secondary appears to be better. So the DLine and secondary should be improved over last season, but could the LBs pull the defense down again?

I understand that every team has question marks and I'm certainly hoping the Bengals have an amazing season. I just feel there's too many questions to be predicting at least 10 wins without even seeing them take a snap. My thoughts are 6-8 wins and I would consider that successful. It would show us moving in the right direction and that some of our free agents and rookies are panning out.

(05-05-2020, 03:18 PM)Bengalholic Wrote: I've posted this before, but only 5 of the 31 teams that have gone 2-14 - before the Bengals last season - had a winning season the next year. Only 3 made the playoffs and none won a playoff game. It would be awesome if the Bengals could have a winning record and at least be in playoff contention, but history says that's gonna be difficult. Not impossible, but still a challenge. 

When you look at the last time time the Bengals were 2-14, they also had a pretty damn good off-season (probably the best until this one) and they went 8-8. To me, that would seem to be a fair marker to judge where this team is. If they're around that, and look like they're making substantial progress, I would be satisfied...just like I was with Marvin's crew in 2003.

I'm optimistic, but trying to stay somewhat realistic too. You bring up some good points brother, and if things play out right, this season (assuming there is one) could get real interesting, really quickly. I do think there will be some growing pains though, with all the new faces, the young LBers, figuring out the o-line, fitting the system to Burrow's talents, etc. I could see them getting better and better as the season goes on. Should be incredibly fun to watch play out.

Excellent points, all.  I think the best thing aside from the talent the Bengals acquired in both the draft and FA is the KIND of players they acquired:  Winners.  Leaders.  Team Captains.  This can't be understated that almost every FA was coming from a playoff team and almost all of the draft picks were team captains.  Some skeptics (you know who you are) will say that this won't change a thing if you can't play football, and I understand that point, but I really, really like the idea of bringing in guys that have that in their DNA.  

Burrow, perhaps being the most successful overall of all of the players brought in, will be leading this culture.  

Great analysis by OP.

It does amaze me those who think winning 5 to 8 games is acceptable. We have not won a playoff game going on 30 years and we should be realistic and patient??????????

Sorry, they blew up the roster. They get a possible HOF receiver back to go with a very good group.

If we don't win 10 games, just one more bad year. Then this time next year, we will say it is OK to have another bad year.

This is not your normal 2 win team, the 2019 team was decimated with injuries on offense. The offense then could not control the clock and caused our suspect defense back on the field, then due to fatigue, the suspect defense lost games a fresh defense would have won.

Ask yourself a question, would you accept 5 to 8 wins if AD was still the QB and be happy? Be honest, no BS. I say most of you would not if you are being honest.

(05-05-2020, 09:27 PM)Bengalitis Wrote: I read somewhere that Burrow had one of the longest time to throw with LSU in his last season. I hope they prepare him to get rid of the ball twice as fast as he did in college. The NFL's pace is way faster than college. Hope he and the coaches are prepared and he can deliver quicker should our O-line turn out to be inferior again.

Burrow if you're reading this, please demand the coaches to give you plays to get rid of the ball quickly.

There is more to it than that:  Last year, Burrow would usually operate out of an empty backfield.  When the opponent didn't blitz, he could see the four rushers and any that might be a threat and he would use his pocket awareness to navigate the traffic while keeping his eyes downfield.  That amounted to a longer time to throw.  

When the opponent WOULD blitz, he was even more deadly.  He could find the open man quicker, and hold on to the ball just long enough for him to make his last break and deliver a strike down the field.

The Bengals don't need to speed up Burrow's clock, they need to adapt to the scheme that best fits his skill set and I have every confidence they will.  

As excited as I am to see Burrow air it out to Green, Ross, or Higgins deep...the thing I am actually most excited to see is the simple pass to the RB out of the backfield.  When there are three WRs stretching the field, a simple checkdown to one of the RBs (not being wasted in blitz pickup) can yield a low-risk, high return completion.  I hope our RBs get a lot of passes out of the backfield and force LBs and Safeties to try and tackle them in space.  

(05-06-2020, 11:27 AM)Luvnit2 Wrote: Great analysis by OP.

It does amaze me those who think winning 5 to 8 games is acceptable. We have not won a playoff game going on 30 years and we should be realistic and patient??????????

Sorry, they blew up the roster. They get a possible HOF receiver back to go with a very good group.

If we don't win 10 games, just one more bad year. Then this time next year, we will say it is OK to have another bad year.

This is not your normal 2 win team, the 2019 team was decimated with injuries on offense. The offense then could not control the clock and caused our suspect defense back on the field, then due to fatigue, the suspect defense lost games a fresh defense would have won.

Ask yourself a question, would you accept 5 to 8 wins if AD was still the QB and be happy? Be honest, no BS. I say most of you would not if you are being honest.

So one day Andy Dalton gives us the best chance to win due to a shortened offseason, and the next Burrow is expected to win 10 games...

You’re all over the place.

(05-06-2020, 11:30 AM)SHRacerX Wrote: There is more to it than that:  Last year, Burrow would usually operate out of an empty backfield.  When the opponent didn't blitz, he could see the four rushers and any that might be a threat and he would use his pocket awareness to navigate the traffic while keeping his eyes downfield.  That amounted to a longer time to throw.  

When the opponent WOULD blitz, he was even more deadly.  He could find the open man quicker, and hold on to the ball just long enough for him to make his last break and deliver a strike down the field.

The Bengals don't need to speed up Burrow's clock, they need to adapt to the scheme that best fits his skill set and I have every confidence they will.  

As excited as I am to see Burrow air it out to Green, Ross, or Higgins deep...the thing I am actually most excited to see is the simple pass to the RB out of the backfield.  When there are three WRs stretching the field, a simple checkdown to one of the RBs (not being wasted in blitz pickup) can yield a low-risk, high return completion.  I hope our RBs get a lot of passes out of the backfield and force LBs and Safeties to try and tackle them in space.

Yep

How many times over the last two or three seasons have we seen Dalton zip a pass to Boyd for a 20 yard gain only to see him put the next one at Mixon's feet on a swing pass and throw 5 feet over Eifert's head on a comeback killing the drive ?

I'm anxious to see if we can't sustain drives much better with Burrow ?

(05-06-2020, 11:46 AM)bengalfan74 Wrote: Yep

How many times over the last two or three seasons have we seen Dalton zip a pass to Boyd for a 20 yard gain only to see him put the next one at Mixon's feet on a swing pass and throw 5 feet over Eifert's head on a comeback killing the drive ?

I'm anxious to see if we can't sustain drives much better with Burrow ?

One of my biggest complaints on Dalton was his ball placement. Sure he got his passes out super fast towards the right receiver, but they would be high, low, behind, etc. Occasionally he would put it on the money, but it seemed more likely AJ would have to make a circus catch on a slant.

Burrow has shown to 'hand the ball off' to his receivers. A simple slant can become an 80 yard gain if you hit a guy in stride. I'm thinking this improvement will help us a lot. Excited to see.