Joe Burrow is a winner, plain and simple. Since his days at LSU he has never been shy about taking ultimate responsibility for his team’s success. And he backed up that attitude by his play on the field, throwing for a total of 8,565 yards and 76 touchdowns over his 2 years there.
His confidence only increased after being drafted first overall by the Bengals in 2020 and subsequently leading them to the Super Bowl in 2021 in just his second season.
But after that, injuries derailed several promising campaigns. And when Burrow did play, a bottom of the league defense made it almost impossible for him or the offense to make any headway. That led to some cryptic and candid comments from him last season that stirred up the national media and fed the suspicion that he wanted out of Cincinnati.
Now, though, he appears to be back to the confident and focused gunslinger that Bengals fans have come to embrace. And it coincides with one of the best offseasons that the team has put together in the past decade.
When speaking to the media this past week, he didn’t hold back:
“Put pressure on guys. I love it. I thrive in it. We’ll find out who else does. I know that we have the kind of people who want to be in that spot. I want everybody talking about the Bengals.
Burrow is right to be confident. This offseason the front office brought in (or drafted) an amazing cadre of defensive players unlike any other, including Boye Mafe (DE/Edge), Bryan Cook (S), Jonathan Allen (DT/DL), Kyle Dugger (S), Ja’Sir Taylor (CB), Dexter Lawrence (DT/NT), and Cashius Howell (DE).
For a defense that finished last in run defense and 25th defending the pass, there isn’t much more a fan could ask for in retooling that unit for the upcoming year. For the past several years, those following the Bengals have been imploring the front office to make significant moves, and this year they got their wish. The team appears to have all it needs, on both sides of the ball, to get back to the playoffs and even to make a deep run as they did in both 2021 and 2022.
And so now the pressure turns to head coach Zac Taylor.
He battled back from an extremely rough start to his time in Cincinnati but paired with Joe Burrow to guide the Bengals to the Super Bowl in just his third season with the team after being hired in 2019. After going 6-25-1 over his first two years, Taylor led Cincinnati to a 10-7 regular-season record in 2021, the AFC North title, the franchise’s first playoff win since the 1990 season, and an appearance in Super Bowl LVI. He also helped the Bengals to the AFC Championship game the following year.
But after that, things went south for both Taylor and the team: the Bengals went 9-8 in 2023, 9-8 again in 2024, and 6-11 in 2025, missing the playoffs each year. Injuries and anemic defenses played an undeniable role in those struggles, and so it seemed as though the front office was more cautious about putting too much of the blame on Taylor and the coaching staff.
But those excuses may be off the table in 2026. And so the question becomes whether the Bengals embattled head coach can develop and implement a game plan that will help lead his team to the same sort of success that they had early on in Burrow’s career. And if he cannot, with all of the upgrades that have been made, and that we all have begged for, it very likely will mark the end of his time leading the Cincinnati Bengals.
