This Bengals prediction will have fans ready to fast forward to next offseason

The Cincinnati Bengals are undoubtedly one of the most talented teams in the league, but they just haven’t been able to put it all together in the last two seasons. After appearing in the Super Bowl for the 2021 season, and losing the AFC title game a year later, the Bengals were set up to remain in the mix. However, Cincinnati went 9-8 in each of the last two seasons, missing the playoffs in both.

Some of those losses were a result of injuries, and others were just tough losses to good teams. Either way, people are losing patience with the Bengals, so 2025 will be a make-or-break year for the team. Unfortunately for Cincinnati, some analysts think the franchise will break.

In a recent CBS Sports piece, Tyler Sullivan named five coaches who will enter the season on the hot seat, and predicted whether they’ll be fired or not. Bengals head coach Zac Taylor was listed, and Sullivan’s prediction was that Taylor would be let go.

CBS Sports predicts Bengals will fire Zac Taylor after 2025 season

Sullivan acknowledged that injuries have played a huge part in Cincinnati’s underwhelming two-year stretch. However, he also pointed out how that’s not the team’s only major issue. The Bengals have consistently had slow starts to the season, and the analyst believes that falls on the head coach’s shoulders.

However, poor starts to the season have also been a key factor, as they own a 2-6 record in their first four games of the season in the last two years combined. That falls directly onto the shoulders of Zac Taylor. The Bengals head coach is entering his seventh season on the job and is 46-52-1 over his tenure. He's coming off back-to-back 9-8 seasons, but those have largely been looked at as disappointing campaigns despite being over .500 because of the high-flying offense.Tyler Sullivan (CBS Sports)

Taylor was hired as a head coach because of his work as an assistant on the offensive side of the ball. The one constant for the Bengals is their offense; when their guys are healthy, they put up points. On that front, Taylor is still excelling at his strength. However, he’s a head coach, not an offensive coordinator.

His job is to make the whole team go, and that hasn’t happened in the last two seasons. If it doesn’t happen in 2025, the Bengals might be tempted to find out what someone else can do with the job.

READ MORE