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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.
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