August 13, 2024 • 21 mins
Our guy Robert Weintraub wrote the Bengals chapter for the FTN Football Almanac 2024. He joined us to discuss the upcoming season on ESPN1530.
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Podcasts of The Mo Egger Radio Show are a service of Longnecks Sports Grill.
Listen to the show live weekday afternoons 3:00 - 6:00 on ESPN1530.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You found Cincinnati's ESPN fifteen thirty.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
All right, there you go, and it's four oh four
ESPN fifteen thirty. Moe Egger here, Glad, lad that you're
with us today, Robert Weintraub. In just a second, one
thing really quick. We played Zach Taylor audio from Bengals practice.
Jamar Chase isn't there and not not there in the
way he hasn't been there so far, like nowhere to
(00:25):
be seen. Zach called him day to day. Jake Browning's
got a rib issue that'll keep him out for a while.
He also at the end there you heard him mention
Brad Robbins. Brad Robbins was at practice at the beginning
and then left with a trainer. So a bizarre day.
The good news is BJ Hill's wife had a baby,
which is awesome. Bj is expected back tonight. Tony is
(00:48):
going to join us again from a Bengals training camp
coming up at four forty five. Plus we have a
Brennman and Jones on baseball as well. We have this
conversation around this time every single year, or it goes
back god by now maybe ten years. Robert Weintraub contributes
a weekly Bengals column for Cincinnati Magazine and last year
joined us every single week during the football season to
(01:10):
talk about it. He is also one of the contributors
to an almanac that we started to talk about and
have Robert on to comment on when it was put
together by Football Outsiders. It has since moved to Ftnfantasy
dot Com, which last year was the first year. It's
the exact same almanac, most of the same contributors. Robert
typically does the Bengals chapter. He's done it this year.
(01:33):
It is an absolute must. It is the single best
preseason NFL publication you can find. Get it now at
Ftnfantasy dot Com and you could correct me if I'm wrong, Robert.
Last year, you did not write the Bengals chapter. They
don't make the playoffs. If it could go wrong, it did.
So the editors did the right thing. They put you
back on the Bengals this year.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Oh as much as I would love to go down
that road with you and think along those lines, I did.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Write the Bengals, Okay, I couldn't remember I did. Okay,
he did the.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Happy years when I when I did not, And I
like to think that the Bengals right fortunes rise and
fall with whether or not I write about them in
the preseason, but.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
It's not necessarily cause and effect.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
However, what I do know is that I did it
this year, and the Bengals are going to have a
much better season than they did last year, much less
injury hit. As we see in training camp already. Nothing
was going wrong. Nobody's falling, no players are holding out.
Everything's copasetic and perfect.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Great to talk to you again, though, It's awesome to
have you so you You did a good job in
sort of outlining in the this year's chapter which you
did right what went wrong last year? And I've I've
said really for months that from a very basic perspective,
one of the reasons why I'm bullish is last year,
if it could go wrong, it did. They were terrible
(02:54):
on defense, They had a healthy and productive Joe Burrow
for a handful of weeks, they were in the toughest
division in the sport, They had a first place schedule,
and they went nine and eight. If half of the
stuff that went wrong goes right and Joe plays sixteen
seventeen games, there's no reason for me to expect they
shouldn't improve upon that when you look at things maybe
(03:17):
on a more granular level, where do you expect this
team to be markedly better?
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Yeah, as you mentioned, obviously we'll leave out Burrow because
if he doesn't play, all bets are off. You mentioned
the schedule. Not only was it difficult last year, it
was actually the eighth hardest schedule we've ever charted, and
that goes back to the the late eighties, so it
was pretty difficult. Your eyes did not deceive you this year.
The schedule, you know, obviously you never really know what's
(03:44):
going to happen with these teams, but just based on
where we project them, shakes out much easier. In fact,
it's actually the fifth easiest. That's because in part because
they're playing the last place schedule, of course, and you know,
some of those teams that had incredible years year, like
the Ravens by our efficiency numbers and other teams that
were really good up there at Buffalo San Francisco aren't
(04:05):
necessarily on the schedule this year. So that's part of it.
And I think you touchdown things going wrong. Really where
it all begins and ends for me is the tackling,
which receded terribly in twenty twenty three, they missed only
seventy six tackles by.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Our numbers in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
That it ballooned to one hundred and twenty four missed
tackles last year. And when you look at the terrible
run numbers and all those explosive plays, that they gave
up twenty three more twenty yard plays last year than
they did in twenty twenty two. The run defense bottom
of the league in virtually every advanced number. Really, to me,
it all comes back to tackling. I mean, you can
talk about this personnel, this scheme, whatever, You get the
(04:46):
guy on the ground and you do it in you know,
without having to chase him down from fifteen yards away
because the first guy missed. That makes your defense look
a whole lot better. Their run defense in the red
zone especially was atrocious, second to last in the league
last year, and that's another place where if you just
fix that, it's one thing to get gashed between the twenties,
(05:08):
but if the other team doesn't even have to pass
inside your twenty, then you got real issues there too.
So if they can get the tackling back to anywhere
close to where it was in twenty twenty two, and
they improved greatly from the twenty twenty one numbers, which
were very similar to what they were last year.
Speaker 3 (05:26):
If you remember, they tightened it up for.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
That playoff run and that carried over into twenty twenty two,
so it's not like they haven't been able to do
it in the past. And if they can just repeat that,
that selves a lot of your issues on defense, and
then Joe.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
Burrow has the ball more often, you have.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
What you want, which is the game being decided by
the Bengals offense and not their defense, and everything flows
from there. So that's really where it all begins and
ends for me.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
It's one thing to expect the run defense to be better,
we all do. It's something else to expect the run
defense to be good. So what does what does fixing
that part of the defense look like?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Well, that's again a great question, and you know it
takes a village. It wasn't just the defensive line, which
is so easy to point to, and of course without
DJ Reader in there, you know, it's not like Sheldon Rankins,
his nominal replacement isn't a good run defender.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
He's actually he had basically the.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
Same run advanced run stop numbers that Reader did last year.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
But you know, they're different kind of players.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Readers more of an absorbed the blocker type guy, and
Rankins more of a knife in and tackle make the.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
Actual play type of player. And he'll have to do
some of that.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
But as we mentioned before, it's it's really not just
the front floor, but to me, it's the linebackers and
the secondary.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
Not to single out.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Of Jermaine Pratt, but he has six tackles in all
of twenty twenty two in a contract year, and then
last year he missed seventeen.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
I think we all know.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
The linebackers weren't as good as they played in twenty
twenty two, and that has to improve, similar you know,
the secondary. Not just do they have to tackle better,
but I think you saw, especially with the safeties, that
they got burned and they began to doubt themselves and
some of those big plays they gave up really kind
of bled over into other more fundamental parts of the game,
(07:09):
including just the basics of tackling and playing against the run.
And I think if you know you eliminate sort of
the big plays against you and make teams go to
the full length of the field, you know, a little
bit at a time, and you make them work harder.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
That just gives your defense much more of a boost
all the way through.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
And I think that's part of the reason why their defense,
the run defense was so bad last year. And if
they can just you know, get to a baseline level,
it's kind of the same way we talked about the
offensive line for all those years. If they can just
be league average in terms of mistackles and playing the run,
the games themselves and the overall unit looks so much different.
So I think that's where they'll get look to concentrate on.
(07:49):
And again, that's if they can manage that. Everything looks rosy.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
From from your perspective. Robert win Troup is with us
the FTN Fantasy twenty twenty four preseason All is available
right now. Robert wrote the Bengals chapter Significant Changes on Safety.
I'm a big Geno Stone guy. Anybody who has watched
the Bengals loves Von Bell. It just it feels like
significant improvement. Where should we see that play out the most?
Speaker 3 (08:18):
Well?
Speaker 1 (08:18):
I mean, yes, like we were talking about in terms
of those big plays, you know, I mean so many
of those were really a product of guys either not
being in the right place or.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Assuming that somebody was going to be in.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
The right place and letting them go, kind of handing off,
if you will, from one defender to another in the
passing game, only to turn around and look, you know,
like the Superman the Spider Man name I should say
that two guys on the Bengals appointing each other saying
you had him, no, you had him.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
That was really a big problem.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
We know with von Bell that's not an issue.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
He knows where everybody has to be.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
And it's not just you know, kind of making up
where they mess up and covering.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
For other guy's mistakes.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
It's getting into the and getting into the even beforehand,
you know, into the film room and saying, look, the
other team wants to do this, here's where you have
to be when they present this certain look. And with
Geno Stone, you know, he's another heady player. He's not
necessarily a guy's going to wow you with his tackling
or his ability to hit you. And you know, even
(09:20):
some of his gaudy interception numbers last year might have
been a little flucish.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
I don't know if we can expect that this year.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
But the one thing he does do well is nowhere
he has to be on the field in relation to
his own guys. So much of what Baltimore did well
defensively last year is because they allowed Kyle Hamilton to
run around.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
And be a wrecking ball wherever they needed and wherever
they wanted.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
Because they knew that Geno Stone was back in a
month and was going to be in the right place
to you know, cover that.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Area of the field that Kyle left to cause trouble.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
You know, if the Bengals can have that, maybe to
a smaller effect, but if they can know for a
fact that the parts of the field where they were
so worried about last year are in good hands with
both with Gino and Von and also Jordan Battle, who
played real well as.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
A rookie last year and can only get better.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
You know, that takes a lot of the pressure off of.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Your defense as well.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
And then again they're not thinking about, you know, worrying
about that. They can just fly to football and make
some of those tackles they didn't make last year.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
So it all flows.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
You know, back to front and front to back, as
I like to say. And if he's not worrying about
so much about one specific area of your defense or
part of the field that helps your whole defense totally.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
Let's talk about the other side of the football. We've
got to start with the offensive line. And obviously things
have changed over the last twenty four hours or so,
finding out that Amrius Mims is dealing with an injury
and it feels quite likely that he's not going to
play Week one. Before they drafted him, they signed Trent Brown,
and we were okay with that. Put him under the
microscope for me, is he is he good? Is he
(10:55):
is he a guy that's just found a way to survive?
Is he a significant upgrade from what they've had there?
Break Trent Trent Brown down for me?
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Well, I think he could say that he is very
good when he plays, which is seldom. I mean, that's
really the issue with him. Again, it's the injury bugaboo.
He's missed thirty games in five years. At his highest
when he's out there and when he's at his you know,
playing his best, he is an upgrade over over a
Jonah Williams and certainly an upgrade over the what we
call replacement level tackle, which is most of the backups
(11:26):
on the offensive line that we see the Bengals run
out there over the years. He's you know, he's got
excellent feet. He's physically just impossibly strong. I mean, you know,
one of these freaks of nature that you just don't
see very often, as you can see by his size,
you know, as in the side the Bengals.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
Actually we do.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
A thing where we wait every team's players by height,
you know, we kind of determine what's the tallest and shortest.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Teams in the league. The Bengals were the tallest team
before they got.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Amarius Mims and Trent Brown, so you can imagine now, uh,
you got a what they They have to raise some
of the doorways around the facility because of these mammoth
news that they have. So it all comes down to me.
For Brown, is you know, how many games is he
gonna play? We talked a lot last year about the
fact that all five starters played all seventeen games and
how rare that was for any team, much less the
(12:16):
Bengals especially, And now we're already seeing MIM's a guy
who came in with injury concerns and not being able
to make it through the summer. He was super promising
and we knew that, and he looked like he was
the part. But he's got to be available. And now
you're relying on Trent Brown, and the big bugaboo on
him throughout his career has been availability.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
And then when you don't have guys like that, every time.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
You take away a potential starter or one of your
quote unquote elite players, and now you're well, you know,
you're turning to your depth pieces, and as we know,
those are best left untalked about.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
So you know, they had basically.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
Le gaverage play up front last year and that was
a big reason why they could survive with Jake browning
in instead of Joe Burrow, you know, and play very
effectively on offense even without the great Burrow in there.
But you know, maybe now this year you'll have Burrow
back there. But again, the offensive line is is the
part of the team where injuries take their toll and
(13:12):
you hate to see that. So hopefully Brown will last
as long as we need them to him, and Men's
can actually play together a little bit.
Speaker 3 (13:19):
Which would be fascinating to see.
Speaker 1 (13:21):
And there won't be, you know, an all around breakdown
up front. But you know, obviously it hasn't started particularly
well this summer.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
Yeah, no question. And you know you mentioned what they
did enjoy last year. They had league average offensive line
play from a line that enjoyed remarkable continuity. All five
players started every game. Obviously, there has been a change
of right tackle regardless of who's out there Week one.
Should I just assume, because they were so healthy last year,
(13:48):
that things are going to be I don't want to
say a wreck, but that their depth is going to
be significantly tested this year because it wasn't tested at
all last year. And when it is, will they be
up to the task.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
Yeah. It's kind of like in roulette, right, just because
it comes up red in one spin doesn't mean it's
gonna be.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
Black to nights.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Uh. Yeah, you know, listen, I think there's no question
we have to assume that they're not going to get
five times seventeen from the starters, you know, I mean,
that's just it's unusual for any team.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
And then it becomes who goes down?
Speaker 1 (14:22):
And for how long you know you can absorb a
guy going I'm missing a game here there?
Speaker 3 (14:27):
If Alex Carrison this is a game.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Matt Lee looks like he's a promising backup perhaps, and
you know it wouldn't hurt him.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
Like quite as much.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
On the other hand, if both Brown and Men's are
out at the same time and you're relying on a
lot of Cody Ford for the you know, back half
of the season and god for bid Jackson I won't
even say his last name pressing, you.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
Know, that looks a lot different. So it's not just
the fact that they're gonna be guys getting hurt.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Almost certainly they're not going to have that same level
of health last year. But the question is just house
to be or is it and for sort of is
a cluster injury is at a particular spot on the line,
or is it just a bunch of nagging things that
don't go away for guys that they can sort of
play through, you know, the Bengals approve and they can
mitigate you know, bad, flat out bad offensive lines over
(15:16):
the past couple of seasons.
Speaker 3 (15:17):
The question is just how you know just.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
How bad is bad and what that means for a
quarterback who you know, we already have obviously great injury
concerns about himself and how much you know is it
going to be worse for him to avoid injury while
he's also running for his life.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
I mean, you know, it's one thing.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
When he's a spry rookie and he gets hurt on
kind of a fluke play, but now he's been in
the league four years and hasn't completed two of them.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
The whole point of it is to.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
You know, build a giant, impassable wall around him. That's
proven it being almost impossible.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
So the question is just how many bricks have to
be replaced? And when I think is really the key.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
There are two more individual players who want to ask
you about Robert win Trump is with us. Mike Kisiki
becomes the latest in a long line of one year
prove it deals for tight ends in an offseason where
they've drafted two more, so they've got some versatility here.
What do you like about Mike Kisiki, Well, he's you.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Know, not even really a tight end. I mean, to
be honest, let's let's start there.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
He had forty five targets last year. We charted him
for only three when he lined up in line. The
rest were slot or wide out.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
I mean, what you know that that's the kind of
player he is.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
He's not going to block for you, but he does
give you a good deep seam threat, which when they
were sorely missing last year. And as we know with Burrow,
you know that's one of his favorite targets. He can
going back to LSU, so he'll give you that. You know,
he is kind of as you mentioned, they drafted a
couple of tight ends. They have Drew Sample and Tanner
(16:49):
Hudson who give you, you know, certain things that are very
important that they need, you know, in terms of blocking
and in terms of how they're going to run their personnel.
It's it's almost but you can't play five different tight
ends at once. You know, you can't play three running backs,
and they have all these wide receivers, you know, they
can't line up with seventeen or eighteen guys on offense.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
So how they do and how they manage.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Their personnel groupings this year is really going to be fascinating.
And how they can disguise what they want to do
from the other team without giving it away based purely
on who's on the field. You know, when you see
mikea Ciki out there, you're like, Okay, well he's not
going to be a guy they're gonna wham block behind.
So how are they going to you know, stay out
of obvious either pass or run situations depending on who
(17:32):
they trot out there. And I think that's going to
be the real challenge, not just for Zach Taylor, but
for you know, first year offensive coordinator Dan Pitcher. And
you know, it maybe helps it the first month of
the season. They only have really on paper at these
one very difficult game in Kansas City, and you'll see
a lot of experimentation and a lot of different guys
out there playing with other different players. You know, it's
(17:54):
kind of getting away from what the Bengals have been
over the last few years, which is you've run out
Chase Higgins, Boyd and and just our guys are better
in your guys and try and stop it. You know,
we're going to do what we do. I think you're
going to see a lot different you know way approached
this year, whether it's you know, scheme and how they
line up under center or how they line up, you know,
(18:15):
with who is where on the field, and it's going
to be MIKEA.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Sicky really fits into that. How are they going to
use him, deploy him, and how are they going to.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Disguise when he's on the field. What they want to
do is going to be you know, a very interesting
aspect and it'll probably you know, turn out to be
you know, determination on how wealth he plays this year.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
All Right, I've got about two minutes. They have effectively
traded Joe Mixon for Zach Moss. Is that a net game?
Speaker 1 (18:43):
I think it's probably a slight net game at this point,
just based on the age and he can't rely on Mixing,
you know, at this stage of his career, really are
how much more? Maybe he is one good year left
in him. But you know, they kind of did the Belichick.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Got rid of him the year early rather than the
year too late.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
I mean, we've been talking about Mixing in the past
game ever since we've been talking, you know about Joe
Mixing coming to Cincinnati. They finally used him effectively that way.
Speaker 3 (19:09):
I mean, he had fifty catches last year. They're going
to have to replace that.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Fortunately, Zach Moss is a guy who made a lot
of plays in the passing game in Indianapolis last year.
You're not losing anything in that respect. You are losing
about twenty pounds, however, which does you know from a
strictly physical budgeoning sledgehammer AFC North standpoint.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Worries me a little bit. You know, he's a guy
who really only played.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
About half the year last year as featured back before
Jonathan Taylor returned from injury. Mixon had about eighty more
carries than he did last year. And how well will
will Moss hang up hold up over the year, you know,
it remains to be seen. And inside the five yard
line he was only three of eleven in his carries
getting into the end zone. Things like that where you
(19:54):
really need just more weight in your running back play.
I worry that that's where they'll they'll miss mixing. Overall,
I think it's basically a bit of a wash. They'll
get more explosive plays out of Moss than they did
mixing and more tackles broken and eluded.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
I think so.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
Between that and the lack of heavyweight play in the
backfield and the excellence in the passing game, it's basically
about the same.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
The FTN Football Almanac twenty twenty four Aaron Shotz is,
I don't want to make him man. Aaron shots Is.
FTN Football Ominac twenty twenty four is available right now
Ftnfantasy dot Com. You know, I'm a fan for the uninitiated.
When they get it, what are they going to read?
Speaker 1 (20:35):
Well, it's you know, team by team breakdown of just
what we've been talking about, advanced numbers, a lot of
film study, a lot of fantasy, especially with FTN in charge.
Now that's a fantasy company.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
So there's you know.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Whole reams of fantasy advice and who's going to be
a breakout candidates, guys who wouldn't have thought about and
you know, just really good and witty and informative writing
that you don't find I like to thank you anyway.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
In a lot of other places.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
And you know a real kind of holistic view of
all the teams in the league and how they want
to try and win and whether or not they'll be
capable of it this year.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Go get it now. It is an awesome resource. Ftnfantasy
dot Com. Robert Wintraub wrote the Bengals chapter always awesome
to have you. We are going to chat throughout the
season every week. Man, I can't wait. Thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Should be great Mo. Thanks as always, Buddy, Thanks.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Looking forward to it. The preseason almanac is a must
Ftnfantasy dot Com. We are way late twenty six after
four ESPN fifteen thirty
You found Cincinnati's ESPN fifteen thirty.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
All right, there you go, and it's four oh four
ESPN fifteen thirty. Moe Egger here, Glad, lad that you're
with us today, Robert Weintraub. In just a second, one
thing really quick. We played Zach Taylor audio from Bengals practice.
Jamar Chase isn't there and not not there in the
way he hasn't been there so far, like nowhere to
(00:25):
be seen. Zach called him day to day. Jake Browning's
got a rib issue that'll keep him out for a while.
He also at the end there you heard him mention
Brad Robbins. Brad Robbins was at practice at the beginning
and then left with a trainer. So a bizarre day.
The good news is BJ Hill's wife had a baby,
which is awesome. Bj is expected back tonight. Tony is
(00:48):
going to join us again from a Bengals training camp
coming up at four forty five. Plus we have a
Brennman and Jones on baseball as well. We have this
conversation around this time every single year, or it goes
back god by now maybe ten years. Robert Weintraub contributes
a weekly Bengals column for Cincinnati Magazine and last year
joined us every single week during the football season to
(01:10):
talk about it. He is also one of the contributors
to an almanac that we started to talk about and
have Robert on to comment on when it was put
together by Football Outsiders. It has since moved to Ftnfantasy
dot Com, which last year was the first year. It's
the exact same almanac, most of the same contributors. Robert
typically does the Bengals chapter. He's done it this year.
(01:33):
It is an absolute must. It is the single best
preseason NFL publication you can find. Get it now at
Ftnfantasy dot Com and you could correct me if I'm wrong, Robert.
Last year, you did not write the Bengals chapter. They
don't make the playoffs. If it could go wrong, it did.
So the editors did the right thing. They put you
back on the Bengals this year.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Oh as much as I would love to go down
that road with you and think along those lines, I did.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Write the Bengals, Okay, I couldn't remember I did. Okay,
he did the.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Happy years when I when I did not, And I
like to think that the Bengals right fortunes rise and
fall with whether or not I write about them in
the preseason, but.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
It's not necessarily cause and effect.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
However, what I do know is that I did it
this year, and the Bengals are going to have a
much better season than they did last year, much less
injury hit. As we see in training camp already. Nothing
was going wrong. Nobody's falling, no players are holding out.
Everything's copasetic and perfect.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Great to talk to you again, though, It's awesome to
have you so you You did a good job in
sort of outlining in the this year's chapter which you
did right what went wrong last year? And I've I've
said really for months that from a very basic perspective,
one of the reasons why I'm bullish is last year,
if it could go wrong, it did. They were terrible
(02:54):
on defense, They had a healthy and productive Joe Burrow
for a handful of weeks, they were in the toughest
division in the sport, They had a first place schedule,
and they went nine and eight. If half of the
stuff that went wrong goes right and Joe plays sixteen
seventeen games, there's no reason for me to expect they
shouldn't improve upon that when you look at things maybe
(03:17):
on a more granular level, where do you expect this
team to be markedly better?
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Yeah, as you mentioned, obviously we'll leave out Burrow because
if he doesn't play, all bets are off. You mentioned
the schedule. Not only was it difficult last year, it
was actually the eighth hardest schedule we've ever charted, and
that goes back to the the late eighties, so it
was pretty difficult. Your eyes did not deceive you this year.
The schedule, you know, obviously you never really know what's
(03:44):
going to happen with these teams, but just based on
where we project them, shakes out much easier. In fact,
it's actually the fifth easiest. That's because in part because
they're playing the last place schedule, of course, and you know,
some of those teams that had incredible years year, like
the Ravens by our efficiency numbers and other teams that
were really good up there at Buffalo San Francisco aren't
(04:05):
necessarily on the schedule this year. So that's part of it.
And I think you touchdown things going wrong. Really where
it all begins and ends for me is the tackling,
which receded terribly in twenty twenty three, they missed only
seventy six tackles by.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
Our numbers in twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
That it ballooned to one hundred and twenty four missed
tackles last year. And when you look at the terrible
run numbers and all those explosive plays, that they gave
up twenty three more twenty yard plays last year than
they did in twenty twenty two. The run defense bottom
of the league in virtually every advanced number. Really, to me,
it all comes back to tackling. I mean, you can
talk about this personnel, this scheme, whatever, You get the
(04:46):
guy on the ground and you do it in you know,
without having to chase him down from fifteen yards away
because the first guy missed. That makes your defense look
a whole lot better. Their run defense in the red
zone especially was atrocious, second to last in the league
last year, and that's another place where if you just
fix that, it's one thing to get gashed between the twenties,
(05:08):
but if the other team doesn't even have to pass
inside your twenty, then you got real issues there too.
So if they can get the tackling back to anywhere
close to where it was in twenty twenty two, and
they improved greatly from the twenty twenty one numbers, which
were very similar to what they were last year.
Speaker 3 (05:26):
If you remember, they tightened it up for.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
That playoff run and that carried over into twenty twenty two,
so it's not like they haven't been able to do
it in the past. And if they can just repeat that,
that selves a lot of your issues on defense, and
then Joe.
Speaker 3 (05:39):
Burrow has the ball more often, you have.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
What you want, which is the game being decided by
the Bengals offense and not their defense, and everything flows
from there. So that's really where it all begins and
ends for me.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
It's one thing to expect the run defense to be better,
we all do. It's something else to expect the run
defense to be good. So what does what does fixing
that part of the defense look like?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Well, that's again a great question, and you know it
takes a village. It wasn't just the defensive line, which
is so easy to point to, and of course without
DJ Reader in there, you know, it's not like Sheldon Rankins,
his nominal replacement isn't a good run defender.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
He's actually he had basically the.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
Same run advanced run stop numbers that Reader did last year.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
But you know, they're different kind of players.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Readers more of an absorbed the blocker type guy, and
Rankins more of a knife in and tackle make the.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
Actual play type of player. And he'll have to do
some of that.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
But as we mentioned before, it's it's really not just
the front floor, but to me, it's the linebackers and
the secondary.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
Not to single out.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Of Jermaine Pratt, but he has six tackles in all
of twenty twenty two in a contract year, and then
last year he missed seventeen.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
I think we all know.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
The linebackers weren't as good as they played in twenty
twenty two, and that has to improve, similar you know,
the secondary. Not just do they have to tackle better,
but I think you saw, especially with the safeties, that
they got burned and they began to doubt themselves and
some of those big plays they gave up really kind
of bled over into other more fundamental parts of the game,
(07:09):
including just the basics of tackling and playing against the run.
And I think if you know you eliminate sort of
the big plays against you and make teams go to
the full length of the field, you know, a little
bit at a time, and you make them work harder.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
That just gives your defense much more of a boost
all the way through.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
And I think that's part of the reason why their defense,
the run defense was so bad last year. And if
they can just you know, get to a baseline level,
it's kind of the same way we talked about the
offensive line for all those years. If they can just
be league average in terms of mistackles and playing the run,
the games themselves and the overall unit looks so much different.
So I think that's where they'll get look to concentrate on.
(07:49):
And again, that's if they can manage that. Everything looks rosy.
Speaker 2 (07:53):
From from your perspective. Robert win Troup is with us
the FTN Fantasy twenty twenty four preseason All is available
right now. Robert wrote the Bengals chapter Significant Changes on Safety.
I'm a big Geno Stone guy. Anybody who has watched
the Bengals loves Von Bell. It just it feels like
significant improvement. Where should we see that play out the most?
Speaker 3 (08:18):
Well?
Speaker 1 (08:18):
I mean, yes, like we were talking about in terms
of those big plays, you know, I mean so many
of those were really a product of guys either not
being in the right place or.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Assuming that somebody was going to be in.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
The right place and letting them go, kind of handing off,
if you will, from one defender to another in the
passing game, only to turn around and look, you know,
like the Superman the Spider Man name I should say
that two guys on the Bengals appointing each other saying
you had him, no, you had him.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
That was really a big problem.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
We know with von Bell that's not an issue.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
He knows where everybody has to be.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
And it's not just you know, kind of making up
where they mess up and covering.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
For other guy's mistakes.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
It's getting into the and getting into the even beforehand,
you know, into the film room and saying, look, the
other team wants to do this, here's where you have
to be when they present this certain look. And with
Geno Stone, you know, he's another heady player. He's not
necessarily a guy's going to wow you with his tackling
or his ability to hit you. And you know, even
(09:20):
some of his gaudy interception numbers last year might have
been a little flucish.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
I don't know if we can expect that this year.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
But the one thing he does do well is nowhere
he has to be on the field in relation to
his own guys. So much of what Baltimore did well
defensively last year is because they allowed Kyle Hamilton to
run around.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
And be a wrecking ball wherever they needed and wherever
they wanted.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
Because they knew that Geno Stone was back in a
month and was going to be in the right place
to you know, cover that.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Area of the field that Kyle left to cause trouble.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
You know, if the Bengals can have that, maybe to
a smaller effect, but if they can know for a
fact that the parts of the field where they were
so worried about last year are in good hands with
both with Gino and Von and also Jordan Battle, who
played real well as.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
A rookie last year and can only get better.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
You know, that takes a lot of the pressure off of.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Your defense as well.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
And then again they're not thinking about, you know, worrying
about that. They can just fly to football and make
some of those tackles they didn't make last year.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
So it all flows.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
You know, back to front and front to back, as
I like to say. And if he's not worrying about
so much about one specific area of your defense or
part of the field that helps your whole defense totally.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
Let's talk about the other side of the football. We've
got to start with the offensive line. And obviously things
have changed over the last twenty four hours or so,
finding out that Amrius Mims is dealing with an injury
and it feels quite likely that he's not going to
play Week one. Before they drafted him, they signed Trent Brown,
and we were okay with that. Put him under the
microscope for me, is he is he good? Is he
(10:55):
is he a guy that's just found a way to survive?
Is he a significant upgrade from what they've had there?
Break Trent Trent Brown down for me?
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Well, I think he could say that he is very
good when he plays, which is seldom. I mean, that's
really the issue with him. Again, it's the injury bugaboo.
He's missed thirty games in five years. At his highest
when he's out there and when he's at his you know,
playing his best, he is an upgrade over over a
Jonah Williams and certainly an upgrade over the what we
call replacement level tackle, which is most of the backups
(11:26):
on the offensive line that we see the Bengals run
out there over the years. He's you know, he's got
excellent feet. He's physically just impossibly strong. I mean, you know,
one of these freaks of nature that you just don't
see very often, as you can see by his size,
you know, as in the side the Bengals.
Speaker 3 (11:42):
Actually we do.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
A thing where we wait every team's players by height,
you know, we kind of determine what's the tallest and shortest.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Teams in the league. The Bengals were the tallest team
before they got.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Amarius Mims and Trent Brown, so you can imagine now, uh,
you got a what they They have to raise some
of the doorways around the facility because of these mammoth
news that they have. So it all comes down to me.
For Brown, is you know, how many games is he
gonna play? We talked a lot last year about the
fact that all five starters played all seventeen games and
how rare that was for any team, much less the
(12:16):
Bengals especially, And now we're already seeing MIM's a guy
who came in with injury concerns and not being able
to make it through the summer. He was super promising
and we knew that, and he looked like he was
the part. But he's got to be available. And now
you're relying on Trent Brown, and the big bugaboo on
him throughout his career has been availability.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
And then when you don't have guys like that, every time.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
You take away a potential starter or one of your
quote unquote elite players, and now you're well, you know,
you're turning to your depth pieces, and as we know,
those are best left untalked about.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
So you know, they had basically.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
Le gaverage play up front last year and that was
a big reason why they could survive with Jake browning
in instead of Joe Burrow, you know, and play very
effectively on offense even without the great Burrow in there.
But you know, maybe now this year you'll have Burrow
back there. But again, the offensive line is is the
part of the team where injuries take their toll and
(13:12):
you hate to see that. So hopefully Brown will last
as long as we need them to him, and Men's
can actually play together a little bit.
Speaker 3 (13:19):
Which would be fascinating to see.
Speaker 1 (13:21):
And there won't be, you know, an all around breakdown
up front. But you know, obviously it hasn't started particularly
well this summer.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
Yeah, no question. And you know you mentioned what they
did enjoy last year. They had league average offensive line
play from a line that enjoyed remarkable continuity. All five
players started every game. Obviously, there has been a change
of right tackle regardless of who's out there Week one.
Should I just assume, because they were so healthy last year,
(13:48):
that things are going to be I don't want to
say a wreck, but that their depth is going to
be significantly tested this year because it wasn't tested at
all last year. And when it is, will they be
up to the task.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
Yeah. It's kind of like in roulette, right, just because
it comes up red in one spin doesn't mean it's
gonna be.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
Black to nights.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Uh. Yeah, you know, listen, I think there's no question
we have to assume that they're not going to get
five times seventeen from the starters, you know, I mean,
that's just it's unusual for any team.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
And then it becomes who goes down?
Speaker 1 (14:22):
And for how long you know you can absorb a
guy going I'm missing a game here there?
Speaker 3 (14:27):
If Alex Carrison this is a game.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Matt Lee looks like he's a promising backup perhaps, and
you know it wouldn't hurt him.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
Like quite as much.
Speaker 1 (14:35):
On the other hand, if both Brown and Men's are
out at the same time and you're relying on a
lot of Cody Ford for the you know, back half
of the season and god for bid Jackson I won't
even say his last name pressing, you.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
Know, that looks a lot different. So it's not just
the fact that they're gonna be guys getting hurt.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Almost certainly they're not going to have that same level
of health last year. But the question is just house
to be or is it and for sort of is
a cluster injury is at a particular spot on the line,
or is it just a bunch of nagging things that
don't go away for guys that they can sort of
play through, you know, the Bengals approve and they can
mitigate you know, bad, flat out bad offensive lines over
(15:16):
the past couple of seasons.
Speaker 3 (15:17):
The question is just how you know just.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
How bad is bad and what that means for a
quarterback who you know, we already have obviously great injury
concerns about himself and how much you know is it
going to be worse for him to avoid injury while
he's also running for his life.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
I mean, you know, it's one thing.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
When he's a spry rookie and he gets hurt on
kind of a fluke play, but now he's been in
the league four years and hasn't completed two of them.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
The whole point of it is to.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
You know, build a giant, impassable wall around him. That's
proven it being almost impossible.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
So the question is just how many bricks have to
be replaced? And when I think is really the key.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
There are two more individual players who want to ask
you about Robert win Trump is with us. Mike Kisiki
becomes the latest in a long line of one year
prove it deals for tight ends in an offseason where
they've drafted two more, so they've got some versatility here.
What do you like about Mike Kisiki, Well, he's you.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
Know, not even really a tight end. I mean, to
be honest, let's let's start there.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
He had forty five targets last year. We charted him
for only three when he lined up in line. The
rest were slot or wide out.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
I mean, what you know that that's the kind of
player he is.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
He's not going to block for you, but he does
give you a good deep seam threat, which when they
were sorely missing last year. And as we know with Burrow,
you know that's one of his favorite targets. He can
going back to LSU, so he'll give you that. You know,
he is kind of as you mentioned, they drafted a
couple of tight ends. They have Drew Sample and Tanner
(16:49):
Hudson who give you, you know, certain things that are very
important that they need, you know, in terms of blocking
and in terms of how they're going to run their personnel.
It's it's almost but you can't play five different tight
ends at once. You know, you can't play three running backs,
and they have all these wide receivers, you know, they
can't line up with seventeen or eighteen guys on offense.
Speaker 3 (17:08):
So how they do and how they manage.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Their personnel groupings this year is really going to be fascinating.
And how they can disguise what they want to do
from the other team without giving it away based purely
on who's on the field. You know, when you see
mikea Ciki out there, you're like, Okay, well he's not
going to be a guy they're gonna wham block behind.
So how are they going to you know, stay out
of obvious either pass or run situations depending on who
(17:32):
they trot out there. And I think that's going to
be the real challenge, not just for Zach Taylor, but
for you know, first year offensive coordinator Dan Pitcher. And
you know, it maybe helps it the first month of
the season. They only have really on paper at these
one very difficult game in Kansas City, and you'll see
a lot of experimentation and a lot of different guys
out there playing with other different players. You know, it's
(17:54):
kind of getting away from what the Bengals have been
over the last few years, which is you've run out
Chase Higgins, Boyd and and just our guys are better
in your guys and try and stop it. You know,
we're going to do what we do. I think you're
going to see a lot different you know way approached
this year, whether it's you know, scheme and how they
line up under center or how they line up, you know,
(18:15):
with who is where on the field, and it's going
to be MIKEA.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Sicky really fits into that. How are they going to
use him, deploy him, and how are they going to.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Disguise when he's on the field. What they want to
do is going to be you know, a very interesting
aspect and it'll probably you know, turn out to be
you know, determination on how wealth he plays this year.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
All Right, I've got about two minutes. They have effectively
traded Joe Mixon for Zach Moss. Is that a net game?
Speaker 1 (18:43):
I think it's probably a slight net game at this point,
just based on the age and he can't rely on Mixing,
you know, at this stage of his career, really are
how much more? Maybe he is one good year left
in him. But you know, they kind of did the Belichick.
Speaker 3 (18:56):
Got rid of him the year early rather than the
year too late.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
I mean, we've been talking about Mixing in the past
game ever since we've been talking, you know about Joe
Mixing coming to Cincinnati. They finally used him effectively that way.
Speaker 3 (19:09):
I mean, he had fifty catches last year. They're going
to have to replace that.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Fortunately, Zach Moss is a guy who made a lot
of plays in the passing game in Indianapolis last year.
You're not losing anything in that respect. You are losing
about twenty pounds, however, which does you know from a
strictly physical budgeoning sledgehammer AFC North standpoint.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Worries me a little bit. You know, he's a guy
who really only played.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
About half the year last year as featured back before
Jonathan Taylor returned from injury. Mixon had about eighty more
carries than he did last year. And how well will
will Moss hang up hold up over the year, you know,
it remains to be seen. And inside the five yard
line he was only three of eleven in his carries
getting into the end zone. Things like that where you
(19:54):
really need just more weight in your running back play.
I worry that that's where they'll they'll miss mixing. Overall,
I think it's basically a bit of a wash. They'll
get more explosive plays out of Moss than they did
mixing and more tackles broken and eluded.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
I think so.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
Between that and the lack of heavyweight play in the
backfield and the excellence in the passing game, it's basically
about the same.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
The FTN Football Almanac twenty twenty four Aaron Shotz is,
I don't want to make him man. Aaron shots Is.
FTN Football Ominac twenty twenty four is available right now
Ftnfantasy dot Com. You know, I'm a fan for the uninitiated.
When they get it, what are they going to read?
Speaker 1 (20:35):
Well, it's you know, team by team breakdown of just
what we've been talking about, advanced numbers, a lot of
film study, a lot of fantasy, especially with FTN in charge.
Now that's a fantasy company.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
So there's you know.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
Whole reams of fantasy advice and who's going to be
a breakout candidates, guys who wouldn't have thought about and
you know, just really good and witty and informative writing
that you don't find I like to thank you anyway.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
In a lot of other places.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
And you know a real kind of holistic view of
all the teams in the league and how they want
to try and win and whether or not they'll be
capable of it this year.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Go get it now. It is an awesome resource. Ftnfantasy
dot Com. Robert Wintraub wrote the Bengals chapter always awesome
to have you. We are going to chat throughout the
season every week. Man, I can't wait. Thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Should be great Mo. Thanks as always, Buddy, Thanks.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Looking forward to it. The preseason almanac is a must
Ftnfantasy dot Com. We are way late twenty six after
four ESPN fifteen thirty
Mo Egger News
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