Bengals can’t overlook Lions game with Ravens up next on schedule
Facing a winless team in the NFL is tricky and that’s what the Cincinnati Bengals are dealing with as they enter Week 6. They’ll play the Detroit Lions in the Motor City and the Lions have yet to win a game, though they’ve come close in three of their five games this season.
Two of the Lions’ losses have come down to the opposing team making a field goal in the final seconds (one of which being a record-breaking field goal by Justin Tucker) and this isn’t as bad of a winless team as many would peg them to be. They play hard through the final whistle and that could be problematic for a team like the Bengals.
Cincinnati nearly let the Vikings and Steelers come back and beat the Bengals in Weeks 1 and 3 respectively, but fortunately, the stripes persevered. They just have to be more aggressive and not let up off the gas when they face the Lions this weekend.
Something that worries me with this game isn’t that of the Lions but the next team on the schedule, which is the Ravens. It’s no secret that Cincinnati has struggled against Baltimore in recent years and this year feels like it could be the Bengals’ year to at least steal a win from their hated division rival.
The Bengals can’t look ahead past their date with the Lions.
We see it all the time in the NFL. If a team has a good team awaiting them two weeks out and plays a “weaker” team in between, sometimes their focus is on that next team rather than focusing on the task at hand.
The Lions might not be a good team but the NFL operates under the “Any Given Sunday” mantra for a reason. Any team can be defeated by a weaker opponent, especially if their focus is on the opponent for the following week. Things can spiral quickly at that point.
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That Bengals/Ravens game will be huge but it’ll be even bigger if Cincinnati takes care of business in Detroit and the Chargers defeat Baltimore. That’d give both the Bengals and Ravens records of 4-2 entering that Week 7 matchup and it’d absolutely be must-see television.