Cincinnati Bengals: Pros and cons from 2021 schedule

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Tee Higgins #85 and Tyler Boyd #83 of the Cincinnati Bengals celebrate after a touchdown (Photo by Justin Casterline/Getty Images) /

Cincinnati Bengals 2021 Schedule Pros and Cons

Pro: Five of the final seven games are at home

Should the Bengals be a far better team than most are anticipating, the back half of their schedule could allow for them to make some noise. They’ll have five of their final seven games in Cincinnati with the two road games taking place in Denver and in Cleveland. The home games are against the Steelers, Chargers, 49ers, Ravens, and Chiefs.

It’s not a fun stretch of games by any means but at least the Bengals will be the home team. Not having to travel is always a plus and the Bengals won’t have to do so all that often in the final month and a half of the season.

Con: Three straight road games in October

The reason the Bengals’ schedule sets up so nicely in the final month and a half is because they’ll be on the road for nearly the entire month of October. After hosting the Packers on Oct. 10, the Bengals won’t return to Cincinnati for nearly a month.

Here are their next three games:

Oct. 17 – at Detroit
Oct. 24 – at Baltimore
Oct. 31 – at New York Jets

The Bengals then return home on Nov. 7 to face the Browns. From there, they stay home for the next three weeks, making them one of just three teams this season to play three straight games at home and then three straight on the road (or the reverse for the Bengals), per Greg Auman of The Athletic.

Other NFL teams have clusters at home and/or on the road. Cowboys, Colts, Bengals all have three straight at home and three straight on the road this year. Texans and Vikings have three straight at home.
— Greg Auman (@gregauman) May 13, 2021

This is going to make for an exhausting stretch for a young Bengals team and hopefully, they can stay above water during their three-game road trip. That’ll be a lot of traveling.