Bengals Trending Towards Playoffs Heading into Bye Week

The Cincinnati Bengals have had an up-and-down start to their season. They started the season with two wins before dropping two in a row. They then beat the Miami Dolphins to head into the bye week at 3-2.

The Bengals are sitting tied with three teams in the AFC North, just one game behind the Baltimore Ravens. How do the Bengals look as far as making the playoffs? Let’s take a look. 

Bengals Playoff Outlook

The Bengals are sitting at 3-2 going into the bye week, but have one of the easiest schedules in the NFL for the rest of the year. According to the ESPN Football Power Index, the Bengals have the easiest schedule left for the rest of the year, while Pro Football Network has them with the fourth-easiest schedule remaining.

The Bengals still play the Titans, Commanders, and Saints, who are a combined 2-12-1, while also playing Carolina, Indianapolis, and Atlanta, all of whom have 2 wins each.

The Bengals and Joe Burrow are also a notoriously slow-starting team that really starts to pick it up as the season goes on. According to Joe Goodberry on Twitter, in games after the bye in the Zac Taylor era that Joe Burrow has started, the Bengals are 27-9, which is good for a 75% win percentage.

That would put the Bengals at 9-3 for the rest of the way, finishing the season with a 12-5 record. While that may not win the division, depending on what the Ravens do the rest of the way, that definitely puts them in the playoffs. 

According to ESPN’s Football Power Index, while the Bengals only have a 33% chance of winning the division, they have a 76% chance of making the playoffs. These odds match up well with the schedule the Bengals have left, along with how well Joe Burrow and the Bengals in general have played after the bye week in the past. 

The start to the Bengals’ season hasn’t been perfect and hasn’t gone exactly as they wanted. They lost two games they had a chance to win against Pittsburgh and Jacksonville. They have had some injuries to key players, and Burrow has made some mistakes.

Despite all of that, the schedule and the Bengals’ post-bye history suggest they still have a strong chance of making the playoffs. With multiple games against teams not playing well, as well as five games left against division opponents, the Bengals control their own destiny and have an extremely strong chance at making the playoffs this season.