Bengals' Jake Browning addresses 'frustrations' amid offense's woes without Joe Burrow

For better or worse, the Cincinnati Bengals plan to stick with quarterback Jake Browning as the replacement for the injured Joe Burrow despite playing poorly across a pair of losses, dropping Cincinnati to 2-2 on the season. 

While speaking with reporters on Wednesday, Browning admitted he and the Cincinnati offense weren't good enough over the past eight quarters of action. 

Jake Browning opens up about frustrations after back-to-back losses

"Personally, you are p----- off," Browning explained, per Paul Dehner Jr. of The Athletic. "You want to score way more points. There’s obviously frustrations with how little production we’ve had on offense. I don’t think anyone is hiding from that. I think you have the personal level and team level of how you approach it. The personal level, remove how you are feeling, go through each play, and are there certain things you are doing that are contributing to the lack of success on offense? For me, it’s giving guys a better chance on some of these deep balls."

After Burrow went down with a potential season-ending toe injury during Cincinnati's Week 2 game against the Jacksonville Jaguars, Browning completed 21-of-32 passes for 241 yards with two touchdowns and three interceptions. He also rushed for the game-winning score in that contest. 

However, Browning has since connected on just 63.5 percent of his attempts for 265 total yards with one score and two interceptions over his last two starts. Both of those picks occurred in Cincinnati's 48-10 Week 3 loss to the Minnesota Vikings.

Jake Browning thinks he played better despite lack of touchdowns

"I think for me, it's just some of the decision-making outside of the pocket I really felt like was better this last game," Browning said about his play in this past Monday's 28-3 defeat against the Denver Broncos, according to Geoff Hobson Bengals.com. "I think that was one positive. I definitely felt like I took better care of the ball and didn't put us back with turnovers, and was able to find the balance of still being aggressive and pushing the ball down the field when it needed to be and not making careless throws or reckless throws outside the pocket."

Browning may need to take some risks during Sunday's home game against the 3-1 Detroit Lions. As of late Thursday morning, ESPN BET had the Bengals as 10.5-point underdogs for that contest. 

Bengals head coach Zac Taylor still has "unwavering" confidence in Browning. It remains to be seen if Taylor will feel the same by the time Week 5 concludes.