Bengals Film Review: Dissecting the 'Joe Burrow Offense' and Why It Looks Easier for Jake Browning

They had some success creating a little bit of conflict and were able to scrape by a bit in the run game. In general, it injected a lot of dynamic into an offense that, before the Burrow injury in 2023, was static, too light/spread out, and everything people are ascribing to them now.

Wait a second though, with 7seven guys in the core of the formation weighing 250 pounds or more, an explosive RB, and the scariest trio of downfield passing personnel in the NFL forcing light boxes, the Bengals shouldn't have scraped by on the ground—they should have dominated.

Look at Buffalo, with Josh Allen and a robust spread passing attack (with Joe Burrow's college coordinator, nonetheless), the Bills have built a punishing run game that forces defenses consistently into box conflict. If you don't get bodies in the box, they can hand it off over and over and rush for 250 yards. If you do get bodies in the box, they play a bunch of three receiver sets and have Josh Allen at quarterback, so you're severely compromised in defending the pass.

Why cant the Bengals do the same thing?

The Bengals' offensive line is not good. It's certainly not consistent enough to win on the line of scrimmage in the run game down to down. The issue broadly is that it's been a mostly fruitless effort that achieves very little downstream impact, even when presenting it.

Defenses are too scared of Burrow, Ja'Marr Chase, and Tee Higgins downfield to commit their resources to a run game that has existential weakness on the line. Running the football at a high level in the NFL requires winning the numbers, and that is achieved with auxiliary blockers like TEs/WRs/FBs and run/pass conflict, all of which the Bengals have, but that isn't where it starts.

It starts up front. Every great run game has at least a very solid run-blocking interior, and the interiors of the Bengals' OL have been awful, especially in the run game. While everyone has been excited, on several different occasions, about lines that (in theory) finally add up to a B- in the pass pro department.

It never works out that way either; due to with injuries, normal age decline, and lack of depth. But these units they've constructed are terrible, unsynchronized, not technical, and overall untalented in the run game. They have tried many of the right things that people are saying they haven't; they just cannot block well enough to make teams honor it with run-stuffing fronts and loaded boxes.

From there, the utility of play action, movement, and all the things that insulate your protection a fair bit go away. Not that said insulation has helped the Bengals protect it, they still give up quick pressures for the quarterback to turn around to when using play action from under center, but that's merely a somewhat related aside.

The "Browning Difference?"

So why does it feel different and sometimes easier with Jake Browning at quarterback?

Well, for starters, it's not. Most of our sample comes from a 2023 season where Burrow was dealing with a calf injury for most of the season. A more fair example would be Burrow in 2024 vs Browning in 2023.

Comparing the sample more honestly, Burrow posted an EPA/Dropback of 0.11 last season, incredible given the state of his protection and run game, and is not reflective of what we saw on tape, which is even more true of the guy he tied with, Patrick Mahomes. Run/pass conflict and unit health are arguably the biggest drivers of that stat.

Regardless, Browning, in his turn as the starter in '23, posted 0.03 EPA/DB. So no, the Browning offense is not better than the Burrow offense when the star quarterback is healthy. The Bengals run the ball a bit more with Browning, go under center a bit more, throw a few more screens, but none of these things really matter all that much to the bottom line, as we've established.

Additionally, the first two points are much less true now than they were back then. The fact is, the Bengals' run game isn't good enough to require the assumption of much risk to stop, and the pass protection unit is not good either. But something is different when Browning enters the game:

While there are a ton of snaps from this past week that obviously look similar to when Burrow was in the game (they don't have time to make an entirely new gameplan), the Jaguars were much more willing to bring bodies into the box against Browning.

In general, NFL defensive coordinators treat backup quarterbacks like children. Don't get run on, play more man coverage, and make the backup quarterback beat you. Looks are more static front to back, and they aren't selling out to deceive and pressure him anywhere near the way they are with Burrow. That's not really something the Bengals can control though, it's not like defensive coordinators are doing that for good reason.

The Bengals' run game doesn't suddenly become scary with Browning under center. While an increased focus on choreography and technique (out of pure necessity) in the next few weeks will surely make it look a touch better the way it did early in 2024 with Burrow, it's still not a good enough line to scare opposing defensive coordinators into forgetting about Chase and Higgins.

The Jaguars really dared Browning to beat them a few times with man coverage that they outright showed. The fact of the matter is though, it's not really Browning who needs to beat you here, it's Higgins. Browning doesn't need to make some S-tier throw or dig out an answer deep into a read if the wide receiver is winning his matchup against a telegraphed look this cleanly.

In general, Browning was just looking to Chase, and with Jacksonville not doing much in particular to focus on him in coverage, the Bengals future Hall of Famer shredded them.

The issue is that, in obvious passing situations when the Jags WERE treating him a bit more like they treat Burrow, his processing is not at the level to handle it, at least when he couldn't lock onto Chase (or whomever was the primary option) and get away with artificially narrowing his vision. That's where you really see the difference.

A word of free advice to defensive coordinators on the Bengals' schedule: You still can't cover Ja'Marr Chase and Tee Higgins without specialization.

Pretend Burrow is still back there and the Bengals can't really do much about it. Stop beating yourselves, stop letting Chase beat you, and proceed normally with the passing game while daring the run game to beat you.

It probably won't, and Burrow isn't back there to shred you through the air.