Hi, get everybody. I'm Dan Hoard and thanks for downloading The Bengals Booth Podcast. The Running Down a dream addition as the Bengals look to get back on track and re establish themselves as a playoff contender as they face the New York Giants on Sunday Night. Football coming up. Chris Collinsworth will be in the booth for NBC and says it's not too late for the Bengals to get rolling.
Dave Lappelman and I will discuss the Bengals defensive issues and in our No The Faux segment, we'll get an in depth look at the Giants from Dan Duggan, who covers the team for the Athletic The Bengals Booth Podcast is brought to you by pay Corps, Proud to be the Bengals official HR software provider by Alta Fiber future proof fiber Internet designed to elevate your home, business, and community to a new level, and by Kettering Health the best care for the best fans. Kettering Health is the
official healthcare provider of Angles. Now here's a quick reminder that you can have the latest edition of this podcast delivered right to your phone, tablet, or computer by subscribing wherever you get your podcasts. It's the greatest thing since Sports Connections. Have you ever played wordle I've been playing the five letter word game for a couple of years and I'm proud to say I have a perfect career record. I've gotten down to my last guests many times, but
I haven't missed one yet. Well, now I have a new obsession. It's called Sports Connections and you can play it on your phone, computer, or tablet. Here's how it works. You get sixteen sports related terms on the screen and have to put them in groups of four that have connections. But you have to be careful because some overlap. If you want to check it out, just search for Sports Connections. And in the interest of full disclosure, my record in
this game is far from perfect. Now let's get to my first guest as we look ahead to this week's game in the Meadowlands. Sunday Night Football is the biggest show on TV, and we are joined by one of the guys in the booth every Sunday Night for NBC, our buddy, Chris Collinsworth. Chris, the way the Bengals offense is performing, they are bound to start winning games aren't.
They You would think you would think. I mean it has been spectacular to watch. I mean it really is. And Joe coming off the injury and being able to do what he did, and even you know, going through two right tackles now and still being able to get the ball out. Burrows just he's magical with the way that he can manipulate the pass rush. He's going to have to do it this week too, because the Giants lead the league with twenty two sacks for comparative purposes,
the Bengals have six. Right, So I mean that's what we're talking about, the kind of pressure of this team I can generate. But I've got to go to Jamar Chase, and you know, you just the first words out of your mouths to have to be Joe Burrow. But at Jamar Chase. The plays that that sucker made in that game the other day unbelievable. I mean, I slowed down that little wide receiver screen pass and I took four
like screenshots. I do a video every week for our guys on NBC just to get everybody ready for the game, and I took like four screenshots of Okay, here it is, this may gain a yard here it is. This may get intercepted here. It is all right. He actually caught the ball, but there's two guys right there, there's another one behind him, and there's another safety behind them. So there's two blockers, two guys and two guys behind them, and at best this is gaining five yards. And it
went for seventy yard touchdown. And I know Joe Burrow had to be going off the sideline going, I'm the greatest cornerback of all time. I'm here, look at me a seventy yard touchdown pass. And but it was it was magical. I mean it really was. And the post pattern in behind Jamar had a little wiggle move at the top of that and got that one that was a hard catch too over the top. My guy, Yosi Bosch, is you know with that big long play, how they
lost that game? I have no idea. I mean, they kept going from a ten point lead to a three point lead, to a ten point lead to a three point lead, you know, back and forth, and then the one interception, which was just the timing kind of thing, you know, is just sort of seemed like it spun the other way. But then it was all going to be fine. You know, and you got the fumble and now you're already in field goal range and just one of those days.
I know you'll be humble about this, you always are, but you are a great wide receiver in your day. Three time pro bowler, four one thousand yard seasons. But when you watch Jamar and t is it like you're watching Aliens a little bit.
You know, they they because a because of their hands, you know, you say, Aliens, I'm old enough to think about et. You know, the big loarm fingers and that that I mean, they literally rebound the basketball. You know, they go up and you see both of them they go up and catch it and you know, yank it down back into their bodies.
Uh.
And they're so powerful at the catch point. And so Joe you can tell, feels so comfortable, you know, just giving them much chance. And you know that's what he did on the interception. He was like, I had tomorrow make this play and you know, Humphrey jumped it. And that's the way it goes sometimes. But yeah, and I think I probably appreciate T Higgins a little bit more now even than I did, because when you saw, you know, Jamar coming back and then you saw Higgins not on
the field. It wasn't quite the same, right, And I know Burrow had to get back in the flow of things and everything that went with that, but it wasn't quite the same without Tea and to have that X receiver that if you choose to overload to Jamar then okay, but you've got a one on one monster on the backside of that that's big and strong and physical, and your five to ten cornerback is going to have to be able to make the play. So the combination of those two guys and the other guy that I've got
to throw into this a couple of them. Eric Hall is a great blocker. He is a great blocker. Now, he missed a couple in that game, but they weren't all his fault. But I mean, that guy plays the game hard. I'm a fan of Eric Hall. And Kasiki makes a ton of big plays for this team. I mean, just it's not always pretty. It doesn't always look like he's the most athletic world beater in the but he makes really he catches in the football game. So I'm
looking forward to it. It's been fun for me just to get a chance to spend the whole week sort of studying them because you know, I watched the games, but it's not the same as preparing for a game, you know.
Chris Joe Burrow told reporters this week he's still not completely satisfied with the way that he's throwing the ball coming back from risk surgery, specifically mentioned spin rate. He leads the NFL in passer rating, leads in touchdown passes, number two in completion percentage. When you hear him say that, are you amused that it's not up to his own high standards.
Well, I wish I had such high standards for myself. You know. If I just get through the opening on camera on Sunday, usually I'm happy. I'm like, Okay, good watch a football game now. But yeah, I think it says a lot. And the fun part for me is they're reflecting back on an era with Kenny Anderson and
I was a part of it. You know, in nineteen whatever it was eighty two, the strike shortened year when he had the seventy whatever it was plus completion percentage, and I think that was the year we were playing in Houston and he hit nineteen in a row or something like that, and none of us knew it. You know, it was like, you know, Kenny Anderson completing passes was not,
you know, some rare occurrence. So for Joe Burrow now to be sort of in that class and help me remember what Kenny Anderson was is all those sorts of things is really fun. But that's a very high standard. I think Kenny Anderson is arguably the most accurate throwover the football that the league has ever seen.
They signed Orlando Brown junior last year, they drafted a Marius Mims this year. Is the offensive line the best that Joe Burrow has had? And what do you think of the way that they performed so far this year?
I think they're good. I do think they're good. I think Volson's been playing a little bit better than what I've seen in the past, and Harris and Kappa just rock solid. Too bad about Trent Brown. That would have been a nice cornerstone over there. But I thought Mems played well and hopefully he's back from I think he heard his ankle something like that. But Cody Ford played all right. He was okay in that game. I kept looking for I go, this is their third tackle. This
is going to be a disaster. It was not, and some of that goes because of Joe Burrow. I mean, I hate to do this, but the guy gets the ball out of his hands and it is really the responsibility of the quarterback to not take the sacks, and I think Joe does that great. The only time he takes sacks is tends to be when he knows he may take a sack and it's third and twelve and
he's got to hold it a little bit longer. But this game against the Giants, they really rely on their past rushing skills and Dexter Lawrence is a beast inside the They don't have Kvon Thibodeau sounds like this week because of the surgery, but still Brian burns and still lead the league. So maybe a little bit more out of the secondary. But we really see Joe Burrow and when he fases the defense like the Giants, which is
much more of a zone kind of back off. You know, we give you the five yard completion, that's that's dangerous space. When you're playing against Jamar Chase, you know, you give him a five yard completion, he is trotting in the end zone somewhere. So I'll be interested to see how they play it, you know, will they put Deontay Banks on them, who's their best corner, and try to match up in some way. But that sounds that sounds dangerous to me too.
Let me follow up on Dexter Lawrence because these two teams haven't played in four years, and back then he hadn't emerged as the force that he is now. He's a three hundred and forty pound nose tackle who had three sacks last week. What the Bengals are going to be dealing with in Dexter Lawrence on Sunday night.
Well, they call him Sexy Dexi, or at least he calls himself that. He's a character. He's fun, he's a Pro Bowl player, and he makes your life hard because think about what they have going for them now with especially when they had Thibodeaux before he hurt his wrist. But you got Thibodeau, you know, a high draft pick on one side, Brian Burns a speedster on the other, and then Sexy dex He's sitting there in the middle.
It's hard because somebody is going to get that one on one right, and it's whoever they choose to get it. Most teams double team Lawrence, which then means you either have to single up Burns or Thibodeaux or leave six or seven in the block, so you're only getting a handful of people out in the route. I tend to think Joe will be the opposite of that. He'll want all his guys out and let him get rid of the ball quickly because he's really sort of masterful doing that.
So we'll see, you know, with Ojelari as he's Ojelari taking the place of Thibodeau, that you know, maybe it comes down a notch, maybe that's a little bit. But Ojeli is a pretty good player too. He was a second round pick as well. But like Pinnock, Jason Pinnock out of the secondary has three sects, So they're going to be bringing a lot of pressure from a lot of different places against this team. But I mean, you can't be any more impressed than what we've seen out
of the Bengals offense. We just you know, now you turn your attention to the defense and hope it can live up to it a little.
We're visiting with Chris collins Worth and let's do that. Let's turn to the Bengals defense in weeks one and two, they gave up twenty nine points. They were performing pretty well in those first couple of weeks, but they've really struggled over the last three. What are the things that you consider to be fixable.
They got stung in that game last week. They had a lot of stuff they were trying to do against Lamar Lamar and the Baltimore Ravens. Hey, let me start with they put up forty one on a lot of people already. I mean, it's a great offense that may be the best team in football if they ever get
their defense together, you know. But offensively, they're almost impossible to stop with Derrick Henry and Lamar Jackson and three hundred pound full backs and the two tight ends that they have, and Andrews and likely and it's just it's a really, really good football team. So it's not insulting
that that happened to them. But I really thought when Dax Hill got hurt and Mike Hilton missed the game already, now you're trying to play exotic defenses where they would play six guys on the line of scrimmage and five guys in a line across the back line. You're trying to mix and match. You're trying to play a cover three zone defense with Geno Stone on the line of scrimmage and renting back to play free safety in the
middle of the field. The one long play they gave up von Bell basically was having to play cornerback on the two tight end side, and it was you know, it's a route that a corner would have seen a million times, a guy wheeling down the boundary and a guy going up to Seaman Andrews, you know, and they just hit the play. You know, that's a play that if Dax Hill's out there, they're not even throwing that ball.
So and then you know, Jalen Davis came in the game, and so now you're trying to run some of these blitz packages. Josh Newton came in the game, some guys that don't have a lot of experience with that first bunch, and so there was this transition period in there about the third quarter where it got a little tough, and then they kind of pieced it back together a little bit in the secondary. But yeah, if you're going to have that many new faces on the back end, you
better have your pass rush together. And we know without Sheldon Rankins and without some of these guys that have been in out of the lineup, it's been harder to do that too. So hopefully some of these guys start getting healthy. Hopefully Mike Hilton gets a chance to play in this game as well. And they're they're putting a lot on Cam Taylor Brett, and you know he had
I mean, he's he's an up and down guy. He has really great plays and he has a few that aren't so great, but he is He's the ace back there. I mean athletically, you go, this should be the guy and then we'll see what DJ Turner can do.
The defense held a players only meeting this week. Mike Hilton came out publicly and said, we are not upholding our end of the bargain. How tough is it for a team when one side of the ball is performing really well and the other side isn't well.
I've been on either side of that equation. I've been on the side where you you know, you're jogging off the feet or jogging back onto the field. The defense just gave up a touchdown and you're looking at him like, are you guys ever going to stop him? And then I've been on the side where the defense is jogging off and looking at us like, are you guys ever going to score a point? Or We're gonna have to do everything ourselves. So if you're around the game long enough,
you're gonna see both ends of it. And right now the defense is struggling some. But it's also you know, they spent a lot of money on offense, you know, I mean, let's face it, this is a team that has really built around the two receivers and Joe Burrow, and you know they go out in their first round draft picks or you know, a lot of times offensive guys and and offensive lineman trying to short up to keep the franchise alive on the back end. So you
have and I think that's the right approach. I mean, this game, you have to be able to put up thirty on occasion. They do it on a fairly regular basis. And lou Anroumo is a fantastic defensive coordinator. I mean, the game plan he had last week was tremendous, and they were doing a good job in the first half of the game. I mean, you're gonna everybody's gonna give up some place to the MVP, Lamar Jackson, Jerrick Henry. It is just like sick. But yeah, I think he'll
have it back together. I'm really interested to see what Lou does this week. Does he pair it back a little bit because he's got some younger guys in there, or now that he's got some of the defensive lineman coming back, does he ramp it up with some other exotic stuff. So, but he's the right guy, you know, he's a really good defensive coordinator. He just needs the part right now.
She'll have the opportunity to visit with players and coaches before the game on Sunday night. Anybody in particular that you're looking forward to chatting with.
Well, we already talked to Jamar. That was fun and Hendricks and so that was fun too. So these guys, it's hard to catch them anymore. We have to split it up, take them when we can. I'm going to go down and watch some practice today, so get a chance to visit with a few more and some of the coordinators. And yeah, but it's a long way from
over seventeen games is a long season, you know. And they go out there and they can get there, get a win against the Giants in this one, and you know, just continue to play offense the way that they are, they're going to beat most of the teams in the league. In my opinion, there was only one team they weren't going to beat with the performance they put on the
other day, and that was the team they played. Only Baltimore had the ability to straight as quickly as they did, and some of the plays Lamar made, I mean they had him sacked three times, four times and key moments and just couldnot get him on the ground. I ask, what he does is really underrated in some way. It's hard to say the MVPs underrated, but he's making some plays and some escapes that we just don't see anybody else in the league. Make.
Chris always great to visit with you. We know you and Mike Trico have a great call on Sunday Night. Thanks so much for your time and look forward to seeing you on Sunday.
All right, buddy, Good talk to you. Dan.
Historically, the Bengals have not fared well since NBC started broadcasting sent night football games, but like most negative stats, they no longer apply. In the Joe Burrow era, the Bengals have won their last two Sunday Night games, beating the Bills last year and beating the Ravens in the playoffs the year before thanks to the fumble in the jungle.
The Bengals Booth Podcast is brought to you by pay Corps, Proud to be the Bengals Official HR software provider, by Alta Fiber future Proof Fiber Internet designed to elevate your home, business and community to a new level, and by Kettering Health the Best Care for the best Fans. Kettering Health
is the official healthcare provider of the Bengals. The Bengals are currently fourth in the NFL in scoring, and if you toss out Week one, where Joe Burrow was still getting comfortable after being out of action since mid November of last year, they've averaged thirty two and a half points over their last four games. Unfortunately, over the same four game stretch, the defense is giving up an average
of thirty two point three US. The defense with lap this week, beginning with a back breaking play from Sunday's overtime loss to Baltimore. Second in goal from the sixth for Baltimore, Justice Hill back in at running back shotguns down by Lamar.
He picks it up. He's in trouble. Babbs has him, but he gets away. Lamar looking throwing into the end zone. Cough, pil likely we're a touchdown. Wow, magic by Lamar Jackson has He dropped the snap, eventually picked it up, got away from Sam Hubbard, and floated it into the.
End zone for a six yard touchdown.
Unbelievable.
Here is my hot take of the week, Dave Lapham. Lamar Jackson is the most underrated player in the National Football League, which sounds absurd to say. The guy has been the MVP twice. Right, But when you see most people's lists of the top quarterback in the NFL, they are usually three names on top Mahomes, Burrow, Allen that Mount Rushmore needs four heads because Lamar Jackson is so
unbelievably good. Yeah, he's not a classic passer, so what He'll create ten seconds until somebody is wide open and the ball might not look beautiful, but it gets there for the freaking score.
It sure does. I mean that was as athletica play as I've ever seen at the quarterback position. He's done it before. He's probably if you put a highlight reel together of Lamar Jackson not just against any I'm talking about just against the Bengals, for God's sake. Seen this guy. I mean he's like an apparition. He's there, then he's not, then he's back. It's like, man, is he a ghoster? Is he real? It is amazing to watch that guy.
He's one of one, you know. When I see and like you say, his sewing arms plenty fine, it's not like he's you know, throw the ball all over the place. He can't hit the broadside of a barn. I mean, his accuracy isn't pinpoint. But man, he makes so many huge plays. And for him to create the time in and out of the pocket that he creates, I mean he'll climb in evade people and by time and then he gets out of pocket and it's like now he has a run past, you know, two way go, and
he is just he is so deadly man. And the thing that impresses me a lot about him is he never seems to change his appearance, his countenance, his heart rate doesn't seem I mean, it's just cool, calm and collected.
Man.
He's out there like you know, yeah, I've done this before, I'm going to do it again. Yeah, boom got you down the football field we go. He is definitely athletically, I think one of one to run straight line speed is one thing, and he's got that. But with Sam, when Sam was trying to sack him on that play, I mean, he ran latterly and almost like an our forty five degree angle, like took three of the quickest steps to separate himself space wise from Sam. That you know,
it made Sam's hit a lot less. It was more of a glancing blow and instead of putting a big smack on him, he just basically eluded it by just that short space quickness. And that's the thing about him man, Like we've talked about before. I mean, you're getting a phone booth with him and you're playing tag it for your life.
I love Kevin Harlan. Nobody on the in the world loves Kevin Harlan more than I do. But Lamar didn't rag doll Sam Hubbard on that play. That was his description, and it's a great word. But he eluded him. He backed, he gave ground, yeah, to prevent Sam from putting a good hit on him. It's just an incredible play. Nobody is going to suggest that the Bengals defense played well.
They gave up forty one points. They couldn't hold double digit leads multiple times in the second half, but Lamar Jackson had a lot to do with the Bengals problems. Last Sunday, let's hear from defensive coordinator lou Anroumo.
He's a great, great, great football player. And you just look at the one just the one play where he drops the snap, fens off Sam Jermaine hit him as you thought about throw and throws a touchdown pass. So like, tell me else, who show me somebody else I can do that. You know, he's just an amazing football player. And uh, but you know that we had our opportunities to you know, get around him and hit him and and uh and you know, we just we just got to do better.
They've got to face him again in five weeks, but only one more time unless they meet again in the postseason. And if you're looking for reason for optimism, I think Paul Daanner Junior wrote a great story in The Athletic just talking about consider the teams that they're going to be facing as opposed to one the ones they faced. They faced the best quarterback in the world in week two, the hot quarterback in the world Jayden Daniels. In Week three,
Lamar Jackson. Last week, the guy's coming up. It's not a murderer's row of great quarterback play. Daniel Jones has had his moments, good and bad. That's coming up this week. Deshaun Watson has been a disaster at least so far this year. A couple weeks after that, we don't know who the Raiders quarterback is going to be. By then
they're talking about Benching Gardner Minshew. So the Bengals defense might start looking considerably better just based on the offenses that they're going to be taking on.
I agree with you. But then the flip side of that is Joe Burrow's damn good and the Bengals are one and four.
Mm hm.
It's like, oh my god, how can you waste some of these performances. I mean, you're wasting a great year. At this stage that Joe Burrows is posting, it's like, man, oh man, I mean seventy two percent of his passes are being completed. That's second right now in the NFL. Twelve touchdown passes leads the league. His quarterback rating and
one thirteen point eight leads the league. But the problem is as you look at quarterbacks against our defensive football team to this stage, like you're talking about sixty seven point seven percent, that's toward the bottom of the National Football League. Allowed ten touchdown passes and only three interceptions, an opposing quarterback rating of one on one point four.
So I mean it's being negated, you know, by defensive support that is not quite up to snuff to stand behind what Joe Burrow and that offense is doing because he is seeing it man and he is delivering. He's playing at such a high level. It's a crying shame that this football team is one and four.
Hopefully the improving health on the defensive line is going to start making a significant difference. It was better last week. They stopped the run at least until the final run of the game by Derrick Henry. Sam Hubbard played better, BJ Hill played well. He was back. They got Miles Murphy and McKinley Jackson back on the field. There's a chance that they're gonna have Sheldon Rankins back this Sunday night, So that portion of the injury bug is getting much
much better and getting back to Sam Hubbard. Yeah, he wasn't able to get Lamar Jackson down on that play, but he had the safety great play to tackle a Derreck Henry in the end zone. He had a sack in the game, applied pressure on a few occasions, and he is feeling much better. Let's hear from Sam Hubbard.
Yeah, I felt great. You know, I had that training camp injury that I had to I said it came back too early, but we had a lot of guy who goes go down and training camp camp sample went down, Miles went down, and kind of didn't really have the luxury of waiting until I was fully healthy. First couple of weeks started slow, just kind of grinding through a
really bad hamstring. And I felt like myself this past week and was nice to make some plays and you know, I'm gonna continue to get better from here on board and trying to do whatever you can to win. And it was nice, you know, personally to just get some of that pressure off and make some plays.
I's like a lot of you guys are winning up front. Did you feel like against any quarterback but Lamar there might have been multiple sacks in that game.
Yeah, we were, you know, multiple times, we were all over him, and he's just such an elusive athlete.
You know.
For sure sacks turned into massive plays somehow, and it's frustrating, but you know, we know that we just keep chopping wood, doing the right thing, those plays will come. And yeah, that's so the NFL.
With BJ back and Miles and McKinley active, there was more of a rotation. How helpful is that for the entire group going forward?
So helpful. Having those guys back is huge for us. BJ played great, you know, having Miles back to give just some more snaps across the board so we can all be fresher. I think he played thirty five his first game back off injury, which is a lot of plays, and he'll continue to get more and keep getting better. And McKinley was getting some action. You know, the great d lines in this league, they just have eight to nine guys that continuously roll and to be able to
play a long season. I know myself personally, I'm excited to take some of those snaps off me so I can be my best. So you know, it's good to have those guys back because we were thin for a while there.
And good that Sam looked a lot better than he had in the previous few weeks. It was an interesting game plan for lou Anroumo, not one of the blitz happy defensive coordinators in the NFL, but forty one blitzes, including run blitzes in that game. He's trying to generate some pressure and some big plays up front.
He is, I mean, he blitzed over fifty percent of the snaps. That is very unloo like. And you're right, he blitzed or was aggressive downhill, bringing people to stop the run as well as pressure Lamar. He decided, you know, instead of having three guys you know, in their rush lanes and dropping eight, you know, I'm going to be aggressive and not conservative in my posture. And it worked for a good part of the football game up until
Henry broke that fifty one yard er. I mean, the two running backs, running backs, the quarterback and running back twenty six carries ninety six yards, right around three and a half yards of pop. They were totally controlling you know, that running game pretty well so and overall, you take everybody that had to carry in that football game, thirty three carries one hundred and twenty four yards. When you take away that fifty one yard run. Now you can't.
I mean it leaked out. But right up until the end of the football game in overtime, you know, they were averaging under three and a half yard three point four plus per carry. So they did take away you know, a good part. They said, Okay, we're going to try to make you left handed, and Lamar's proven to be ambidexterrous, you know, make him use either hand. He can still kill you. I mean really, yeah, he's got a bunch. It's uh, it really is incredible. But you look at this,
you look at this game coming up. Jones. Jones is mobile. There's no questions is that he's not Lamar, but he is mobile. So better you know, make sure that when you are closed in on Daniel Jones you're finishing them because he can. He can. He's elect athletic. He's very up and down with his level of play. He played well against Seattle. He had thirty eight yards rushing and threw for two ninety seven. Not too bad. Really, that's that's a you know, a nice little day's work right there.
But and you look at it very similar to what they saw in Baltimore. You know, a mobile quarterback offensive line that they've rea he done. They went out in free agency, got three starters, and they want to run the football. Support you know that that is a starting point. Offensively, their Tracy their fifth round pick this year, rushaurund in twenty nine yards against Seattle, so he supported you know what what Jones was doing. So it's it's like, Okay,
you played the Giants on steroids offensively and defensively. When you played Baltimore last week and you hung in there, lost on a walkoff kicker. We'll lose it on a walk off kick in overtime. It's on the road, granted, you know it's it's it's never easy traveling New York fans can get loud and you know, rabid and all that, but got to beat this football team. Bottom line is, it's almost like you had a dress rehearsal against offensive and defensive units that kind of do what the Giants
do to the to another level with better athletes. I mean, hell, they had fourteen have fourteen Pro bowlers on that damn team. It's crazy counting the two specialists or twelve and six defensive Pro Bowlers and four offensive Come on, now, you're not going to find that kind of a numbers. You look through the New York Giants roster up and down. They've got good players. They don't have players like Baltimore put on the football field.
The only Giants player picked for the Pro Bowl last year was defensive tackle Dexter Lawrence, and the team doesn't have a single player on offense who has ever been to a Pro Bowl. For more on the Giants, we turned to Dan Duggan, who covers the team for the Athletic He joined Lapp in Me this week on the Bengals Game Plan Show, and Dugan has high regard for the Giants coaching staff.
When you go back to twenty twenty two, I think the only reason the Giants won nine games then year one a playoff game was the coaching advantage that head almost you know, weekly where they did not have a lot of talent on that team, and Brian Davile is kind of able to rub two six together and get that offense.
You know.
The thing is you look at the box score, I think get twenty seventh of the league scoring. So you think I'm crazy to say that they have some great schematic advantage, but I think that there's limited offensive talent. You know, obviously League Neighbors is a superior talent, but he didn't play on Sunday. And then even Devin Singletoary, their number one running back, he didn't play on Sunday. And you know they put twenty nine points and even six of
those came on a block field goal. But you just watch the way, week in and week out his plan to attack opposing defenses. I think he does a really good job of coming up with a plan that is going to accentuate what his guys can do well, but also pick apart what the other team's defense doesn't do well, and really never really feed into what they do, you know, into this straints. Now, again, that might sound basic, but I've been around here long enough to see that that
does not always happen with Giants offenses. And you even see the other teams knowing the Giants defensive weaknesses, like why are they not running the ball, why they're not throwing deep, whatever it may be, and it seems like some coaches and some coordinator a little less FLEXI I think that's one of Davie's strengths. And then he has
to dump tail with the defense. You know, a new coordinator comes in here, Shane Boone, who had been to Tennessee drastically different style than Wake Martindal US the last couple of years figured it who takes some time the really young secondary, and that unit has been a pleasant surprize as well. I mean they lead the league in sacks, which a little misleading because it's basically racked him up against Seattle and Cleveland. Haven't done much the other three games,
but definitely have shown something there. And yeah, I think he's done a pretty good job because again they're very young in the secondary and it hasn't been as exploited nearly as much as I expected. Coming into the year.
The offensive line was was basically overhauled. How is it playing? They went out and they signed some veteran free agents. Have they made an impact? Oh enormous.
Yeah, I mean that's been an Achilles sale of this team. You know, basically since that last Super Bowl, they went with eli as basically all downhill and tried every sort of different combination, spending on free agents, using top ten picks like really else. Thing has worked. So this year this offseason that kind of went just like get some functional vets in here, and you know, that's like kind of a give you a baseline level of competency, which is a big step up from once they've had in
recent years. And that's what they've gone. I mean, like Andrew Thomas is a Pro Bowl level left tackle, young guy in the fourth season now. But the other three of the other four starters are you know, John Runyan who was in his fifth year, Greg Van Rowden is like his twelfth year, Jermaine Iluminer is like his eighth year, and then they have a second year center, John Michael Schmith.
But with Thomas being the one like guy who can count on, the other four guys are just playing at like a solid level and maybe even above saw that might be selling a short pass protection and that's just helped everything. Like Daniel Jones isn't you know, running for his life every time he hits the back of his drop. There's some big holes for the run games. He saw the Seattle game, like the rookie tyro Tracy. Everyone typing up, you know this rookie running back and he did play well.
You or I could hit some of those holes and there was massive holes and he did a good job getting through them and getting to the second level. But I think the guys up front deserve a lot of credit, especially when you consider how much of a disaster The Lion has been here for the better part of a decade, so they've definitely made big strides just to have a nice, solid, functional unit, and that's I think that's been one of the biggest differences with this team so far.
Dan Duggans our guest. He covers the Giants for the athletic Let's stick with offense. These two teams haven't played in four years. So we've all watched Daniel Jones on TV. We can read the stats, but you see him every week. What are his biggest flaws? Why is there so much inconsistency with Daniel Jones.
No, you kind of stole my answer is gonna be it is just the inconsistency. Now get to the root of that. I'll try and do that here for you. But that's been the thing. I go back to that twenty twenty two season where he showed them enough to give him the big second contract. But it's always just been like glimmers, he can't string three and four really high level games together. Now that year he went to a high level, but he took care of the ball did just enough used his legs. He kind of scraped
and clawed that season. The last year was a disaster, the old line, just ravage of injuries. He dealt with, you know, two major injuries and neck and then the ACL the knocked out of the year. The coming back to this year, you know everyone's from sure saw hard knocks. It was such a do or die the way Joe Shane the GM laid it out, like we either find out if he's the guy, or we're gonna have to pivot. And I mean, let's be honest, they were already trying
to pivot. They tried to trade up for Drake May and obviously weren't successful. But I think the thing he's done this year, if you throw out that Minnesota game, which you have to because that was ugly. The Week one, you were like, oh boy, this is gonna get I mean, we're there was legitimate talk if he was gonna get benched if that kept up. That's how bad Week one was.
But since then, the four games since then, he's played varying levels of solid, Like has not had any monster four or fifty yard five touchdown game, but he's not turning the ball over he's getting the ball out quick. He started to use his legs more against Seattle, so it kind of feels like the AHL maybe isn't some stance affecting him anymore. But I think the thing he's done really well and it goes handing him. With the last question about the old line, he's kind of you know,
getting through his reads a little bit. That's always been one of the biggest knocks on him is he'll lock onto a guy and you know, obviously defenses catch catch on that and they can you know, get into deceptions that way, or just kind of sport with the Giants trying to do Having a little more time in the pocket, I think obviously that helps any quarterback, and it's helped him, right.
I think he's a little more comfortable back there, and he's making plays, you know, on a second read or you know, you know, getting out of pressure and still throwing the ball down field. Stuff. He really hadn't done a lot throughout his career. So but yeah, to to bring it full circle, the consistency has been the thing where it's like he's had a couple of good games. Now let's see on Sunday night. He has been terrible in prime time? Can he have a big time game?
You know?
And you know not the Bengals record is what it is, but this is still a huge game for the Giants, and can he deliver and and that's the kind of the jury is still out on him having that level of play consistently.
You talk about the offense and scheming it up and uh, you know, extentient in the strengths of the players and attacking defensive weakness on the other side of the football, it doesn't seem like looking at it, and I haven't looked at that much yet, but looking at it, it doesn't seem to be that sophisticated. It seems to be a relatively simple scheme, predictable in a lot of ways.
But the talent of the players, I think, you know, uh, the way they execute so consistently, it makes it makes it hard to block, you know, I mean, what what do you think is is this? This defense? Isn't They're not always trying to trick you a fool you They just play well, don't they?
Right?
Yeah? I mean, Shane Bone's ideal world is to just run rush the front four. You know, you have a well funky with the coverages and you do some disguises with that, but yeah, he wants to just get the pressure with four. That's why I even say that sack total is a little bit fluky, because they had nine against Cleveland where Cleveland's OH line was absolutely decimated and Shaun Watson is just you know, horrible, you know, pocket awareness at the stage of his career, so they kind
of released the hounds and Bliss like crazy stuck. You never see him do as smart because I mean, obviously it was effective and it parts in that game, but that's not what you're gonna see on Sunday. I would certainly not expect to get the quarterback like Joe Borrowing against the receiver Cincinnati has so weekend and week out, it's much more relying on that front four, and that's from fourth took up a blow today with team on Timba so uh broke his wrist in Sunday's game against Seattle.
He's gonna be out probably anywhere from four to six weeks, so obviously won't be playing on Sunday. So again, for a unit to rely so much on the front four to generate pressure to lose a piece of that hurts and even at that it's really more of a front three because the second defensive tackle is you know, in passing situations, is an undrafted rookie name Elijah Chapman, who it does have a couple of sacks this year, but isn't a guy who down in, down out like a
game wrecker. But if game wreckers, everything starts with Dexa Lawrence. I mean you might I think he's I think at this point that you know, maybe the record would keep him out of it. The team's record. He should be the defensive player of the year as a nose tackle that six sacks in five games, and that's with getting double teams every play. Like he absolutely just disrupts games. So if the other team's interior line can't, you're in
a double on no matter how good you are. But if you can't at least do a passle doubling him, he'll just ruin the game. And that's what he did in Seattle, That's who did in Cleveland. Like the games they've won, it's basically he just caves everything in and offenses can't function. So that that's where everything you have about game plans since day, game plan one hundred percent starts with the hell, we're going to keep this guy out of Joe Barrow's lap all day because that's what
he does. And it's really remarkable to see a guy at his size, he's such a dominant factor as a pass rusher.
In quick question, I mean they they have to double him, right, not four hands, four eyes. I mean that's kind of the mantra. And he's still kicking butt like that against doubles.
Yeah, I mean, listen, they do some things that. In the Dallas game, he was pretty quiet and they doubled into like literally historic rate, you know, according to Next Gen Stats, And he bristled because PFF put out a stat of like Cooper Beattie the freshman, the freshman the rookie center for Dallas, like didn't give him any pressures and and dextually really doesn't sound off on social media. He like fired back basically saying they know what they
were watching. He was whooping his butt all game. Maybe he got the bit mad for Seattle and he had another extra gear, but no, yet every team is going to double him. I think that that's one thing I'll give Shane Bowing credit because you know there's ways around that. It's not easy, but he did a good job against Satt. He does a lot of simulated pressures, so that might be walking Bobby Ocharacter in the middle linebacker up, head up over the center of the center has to least
to count for him. And now by the time of Kak's dropping back and coverage and the center is going to help the right guard, the right guard's already been a turnstile because Decks blew buy him off the snap. So stuff like that. You know, you probably can't double him every single play, but I'm sure the intention of every Alliant coach and coordinator is gonna be, we need to accompli this guy and if we can get four hands on it. Lead you said, we need to do
that as much as possible. But you know there are times where you get him one on one, and if you look back in one of the sacks he heads in the Seattle game, he literally took a grown man and has three pump spaces walking right back into you know, Smith's lap and sacked him. So it's a scary site for any guard I assume when you go one on one with deck.
I bet PFF is based in Cincinnati and largely owned by Chris collins Worth, so Dexter will see him on Sunday if he wants to have a word with Chris about the uggrading system in that game. Here's my final question for you, Dan, will Malik Neighbors play? Do you know?
I don't know, But it's Wednesday. So he suffered the concussion on a Thursday night game, you know, two weeks. We're coming up on the two week mark tomorrow, so obviously didn't play last week. He was on the field today on the side, you know, in this helmet, doing like agility stuff with trainers. So in my experience, that's the first step to really getting back on the playing where last week he didn't do anything. So I feel like he's he's on track right now as long as
there's no stepbacks. And then tomorrow presumably he'd progress a non contact participant in practice Friday. You'd hope that that goes well and he'd be a full participant, and then you get cleared by the doctor after that, you know, again, assuming there's no symptoms or anything in return. So I would say as a as a Wednesday night, which is you know, it's hard for me to forecast how a
guy's brain has got to react. I think he'll play just assuming he doesn't have any setbacks, which again that's an assumption I'm making because there's no way to know. But yeah, I would think he's at least he's on the track, and again, assuming no setbacks, he should be good to go.
Uh my final question, and appreciate all the knowledge and all the time you've given us. The two inside linebackers, I mean they have a stud in front of them, obviously in Lawrence. So it's when we talk about him beating double team, it's it's hard to get to these guys. And they can run. I mean they can flat out run. They are both tackling machines, aren't they. I Mean they've combined for I mean so many big plays. The tackle
total is ridiculous. And let's see the inside linebacker group they've they've they've got sixty one total tackles and three quarterback sacks out of that inside linebacker group. That's pretty darn good production.
Yeah. No, I think to your point on the tackle, that definitely helps to have, you know, a three hundred and fifty pound guy just clogging up the middle and they're getting you know, probably some more clean runs to the backs. But yeah, both those guys, Bobby o'caake Mike McFadden are athletic guys and they'll get downhill. McFadden's actually had I wouldn't they better. Yet No, Cake is like, you know, he was a you know, kind of big money agent signing last off last offseason, had a great
first season. He's been fine. This should not nothing bad. But the new scheme, I don't know if he still kind of feel his way through it. Because the thing he did last year we haven't seen yet is maybe a splash played like for a middle linebacker, like he was getting his hand on balls, a getting accepted, he was picking himself, force fumbled all that. We haven't seen that yet. But he's shown that that ability in the past. And then McFadden, Yeah, he's the thing I say with McFadden,
he's always in the right spot. Now that might lead to a TfL, that might lead to an ugly miss tackle. Like he you know, he's still a little in consistent and that's finishing the play, but he must he reads it fast, gets to the spot and then again that it's just about matter of finishing. But yet, No, they're they're two you know, pretty good players. Because this run defense got the really rough start. Uh, Minnesota and Washington kind of ran all over them, and they've tightened it up since then.
I don't know.
I'm sure Cincinnati is going to be content to probably air it out because I do still think the secondary is the is the rush mark on this defense. So if I was them, I would take my chances with the With the two guys that have outside there, I think that that's probably where the biggest mismatch would be. But in terms of running the ball, I would think that, you know, the middle linebackers for the Giants, you'll be able to hold up pretty well.
All right, thanks to Dan Duggan, And that's going to do it for this episode of the Bengals Booth podcast, brought to you by pay Core, Proud to be the Bengals official HR software provider, by Alta Fiber future proof fiber Internet designed to elevate your home, business, and community to a new level, and by Kettering Health the best care for the best fans. Kettering Health is the official
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