Former Bengals Star Rips Team's Offensive Line Approach

 The Bengals have had terrible offensive line play for the majority of the past decade, and 2025 might be the nadir. The entire unit has hemorrhaged pressure and run stops to the point of sub-48 overall grades on pass blocking and run blocking from Pro Football Focus (NFL's fourth-worst pass blocking grade, worst run blocking grade).

Entering September, Cincinnati ranked last and 23rd in ESPN's pass and run block win rate. They are arguably the worst unit in the NFL, and former star offensive tackle Andrew Whitworth has a good idea why. 

Cincinnati hasn't drafted and signed a single offensive lineman to a second deal in the past decade.

"I think it's evaluation," Whitworth said on The Pat McAfee Show. "If you look at it, I'm gonna throw myself in the mix, it's been 2011 since they drafted a guy and he re-signed a contract, and they've let Kevin Zeitler and me walk in free agency. So if you can't draft an offensive lineman, and then you've let guys leave who continue to go elsewhere and win, you clearly have an evaluation problem of the priority of the position."

Cincinnati did just that with Whitworth last decade as they haggled over a long-term deal in 2017 before he went off and signed with the Rams as a key piece of the team that would eventually beat the Bengals in Super Bowl LVI.

Now, the Bengals sport a unit that boasts zero starters with a PFF grade this season above 58 overall.

The whole group will try to turn things around this weekend against Green Bay.