USAT: Bengals Wire audio clip

USAT: Bengals Wire

Feb 19, 2022

- - - The Cincinnati Bengals don’t have to look far to see a blueprint that can fix their offensive line. - Those Kansas City Chiefs the Bengals played in Week 17 and in the AFC title game likely only made it that far because the front office over there went all-in correcting the offensive line in front of Patrick Mahomes. - After the line in front of Mahomes collapsed in the Super Bowl, the Chiefs, to use a cliche, left no stone unturned in attempting to fix it. - They: - - Spent huge money on one of free agency’s top names with Joe Thuney at five years and $80 million. He responded with an 80.5 PFF grade (88.8 pass blocking), letting up just one sack on nearly 1,200 snaps. - Pulled off a blockbuster trade with the Ravens for left tackle Orlando Brown. They traded a first (31st overall), a third, a fourth and a 2022 fifth in exchange for Brown, a second and a sixth. Brown allowed four sacks, but had a 75.2 PFF grade and played more than 1,100 snaps as an upgrade. - Drafted Creed Humphrey in the second round and Trey Smith in the sixth. Humphrey had the potential to start as a rookie and did, earning a 91.4 PFF grade. Smith, a head-scratcher of a faller, predictably won a starting guard job and was solid over nearly 1,200 snaps with a 72.4 PFF grade. - - Granted, much has to go right for this sort of thing to work out. This isn’t suggesting that spending big cash, pulling a trade and drafting multiple guys will just magically fix the line. - But the Bengals just so happen to need four upgrades across the offensive line and frankly, Jonah Williams shouldn’t be considered a lock to stay at left tackle, either. And it might be unwise for the team to simply bank on second-round pick Jackson Carman to develop into a starter after failing to get on the field for most of the year. - The Bengals have the cap and draft assets to bring in multiple upgrades. They might not want to splash on the biggest of names on the market — that sort of cap hit could maybe let them obtain two starting-caliber linemen, instead. And drafting linemen hasn’t always worked out for this front office (Price, Ogbuehi, etc.). But the opportunity to pull off a similar feat as to what the Chiefs did is there. - Either way, the Bengals don’t have any excuses given Burrow’s Super Bowl injury and the fact he’s pacing to outdo Andrew Luck‘s horrific sack numbers. - The Chiefs already wrote the blueprint and if the Bengals can put their own spin on it in a way that makes sense, they’ll position themselves for another AFC run. - - List - - 11 offensive linemen the Bengals should target in free agency to help Joe Burrow - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Email - - - - - Sign up - - - - - - - - Like this article? - Sign up for the Bengals Wire email newsletter to get our top stories in your inbox every morning - - - - An error has occured - - - Please re-enter your email address. - - - - - - Thanks for signing up! - - - You'll now receive the top Bengals Wire stories each day directly in your inbox.

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