The 2023 Cincinnati Bengals season has been a letdown overall. Joe Burrow is obviously playing through an injury, and the team started the season extremely slowly.
The team got better as he recovered, but he got hurt again in one of the most important games of the season. It’s up to Browning because Burrow is expected to miss the remainder of the season.
Examining the team’s DVOA at this time and attempting to determine what went wrong in contrast to 2022 is worthwhile.
Defense-adjusted value over average, or DVOA, attempts to modify offensive and defensive rankings according to the opponent faced and the circumstances. While going for two yards on first and ten might be a bad play, doing so on third and one gives the offense another set of downs and is therefore a positive play.
When rating the offense and defense of a team, DVOA makes an effort to account for circumstances such as those. Now that we have that settled, let’s examine the DVOA rankings as supplied by a tweet from Jay Morrison.
When examining the Bengals’ rush offense and overall defense, it is evident that they are a tough team overall. According to those rankings, they were the worst and second worst teams in the league, respectively.
If they can just get a healthy Joe Burrow back, the pass offense should be fixed, but how they can strengthen the run game will remain a mystery.
In order to improve running back efficiency, the team should consider adding a player with more creativity, as Joe Mixon performs below average in most metrics including yards after contact and forced missed tackles.
In addition, since Frank Pollack has the Bengals investing a lot of cash and draft picks in the offensive line, which is struggling this season, the team may try to look for a new offensive line coach. For the run game, the Bengals must take some action, no matter what they decide.
The run defense and explosive plays that have been allowed have been major problems on the defensive end. The team’s inability to adjust has made it evident that losing Jessie Bates has been more problematic than anticipated. Along with other young players like DJ Turner, Cam Taylor-Britt, and Myles Murphy, who are all seeing their roles grow, Dax Hill and Jordan Battle are developing together at safety.
