The Cincinnati Bengals and Joe Burrow are way ahead of the curve when it comes to counteracting modern NFL defenses.
That’s proof easily seen by Burrow’s progression as a player, never mind the numbers. Attentive fans know the details — he and the Bengals offense were so-so at best through the first fourish weeks of 2022 (the burst appendix played a part too).
But Burrow then faced more Cover 2 looks than any passer in the league and had the best completion percentage and number of first downs against it by season’s end.
So in a league finally seeing defenses clamp down on deep passing, how do the Bengals counter the counter?
An amoeba offense.
In a fantastic deep dive from The Ringer’s Kevin Clark, we get a behind-the-scenes look at how Burrow and the coaches go into each game:
Because of this, Callahan said, the offense uses a trick he gleaned from his time coaching Peyton Manning in Denver: They deploy a massive play sheet with different coverage boxes and create an on-the-fly game plan once the team sees the defensive tactics it’s up against. “It’s ‘OK, bang, this is a Tampa 2 game. We’re right on that,’ and we say, ‘Joe, what are your three favorite ones, bang bang bang,’ and he usually executes them pretty well,” Callahan said. “It’s sort of this free-flowing [thing]: Here’s our initial plan, here are our backup plans, and then [asking] Joe what he sees and he’ll say, ‘Call this, it’s gonna be wide open.’ And usually it is. It’s about as much fun as you can have as a coach when you have a guy that can handle that.”
Notably, Bengals players and coaches revealed that defenses often play them differently than any other team, pulling out coverages and looks they’ve never put on film.
Burrow and Co. excelling in this manner is, first and foremost, a product of the passer. But Brian Callahan working with Peyton Manning and Zac Taylor coming from the Sean McVay tree sure doesn’t hurt, either.
This should give Bengals fans confidence, if nothing else, that the team will again adapt smoothly to whatever defenses throw out there in 2023.
