Jalen Davis injury may foreshadow a Wally Pipp moment in Cincinnati

The Cincinnati Bengals are licking their wounds after Week 3's loss in Pittsburgh with an extremely beat up secondary. Safeties Bryan Cook and Kyle Dugger were hobbled this past Sunday, and now, starting nickelback Jalen Davis is headed to injured reserve with an ailing hamstring.

That kind of checks out, because Davis did not look good against the Steelers. He played only 19 snaps according to PFF's tracking.

Davis was on the practice squad for much of his career, yet stayed loyal to Cincinnati and finally got his shot to start in the slot last season. He responded with a stellar performance, which allowed Dax Hill to flex back out to the boundary where he's easily best suited.

But now that Davis is down, and Ja'Sir Taylor remains on IR for another week, 2025 undrafted free agent Bralyn Lux could cement himself as the starter in a dialed-down version of Lou Gehrig replacing Wally Pipp on the Roaring Twenties Yankees.

Bralyn Lux can rise from practice squad obscurity to bright Bengals spotlight

Although the team's announcement on Jalen Davis' injury didn't include any mention of Bralyn Lux getting a call up from the taxi squad, the Bengals did sign two safeties. That could mean Lux is in line to be promoted in short order — if only because Cincinnati's options are limited.

I advocated this morning for the Bengals to give Josh Newton actual playing time, or at least make him a game day active! Even though he can play the nickel, however, his skill set is better suited on the boundary. Same goes for Dax Hill. Same goes for Tacario Davis. Same goes for D.J. Ivey, too.

Lux is the only true nickel prototype in the Bengals' cornerback corps. His modest 5.15 RAS score coming out of Texas Tech was one reason he went undrafted, but make no mistake: Lux is savvy in coverage and can absolutely thunder dudes in run support.

I thought Lux would be a bigger factor as training camp went on once he got some reps with the first-team defense in that one mandatory minicamp practice. That's not how things played out.

But now is Lux's chance to pounce. Like Davis once upon a time, Lux has waited in the weeds for well over a season for his opportunity. It's a knockin', and it's a knockin' loudly.

The Bengals' tackling efforts in Week 3 were frankly pathetic. I love me some DJ Turner, but that man shies away from getting his nose dirty when taking opponents to the turf.

This Cincinnati defense needs someone who isn't afraid, who is ready to hit, and if he does make a mistake, will at least look decisive and not hesitate while doing so. Too often I see Bengals defenders second-guessing themselves in real time, most notably linebackers Barrett Carter and Demetrius Knight Jr.

Lux brings a certain attitude and swagger that brings to mind Mike Hilton, another UDFA with an underwhelming athletic profile who made up for it with an elite football IQ and tackling prowess.

Over the last two preseasons, per PFF, Lux has allowed only an 80.6 passer rating. He's quite sticky in coverage as well. If the Bengals are looking for grit, and they should be, Lux has it in spades.

...And let's not get it twisted. I'm not saying Lux is the next Lou Gehrig of football. It's more that the iconic baseball trivia analogy was painfully relevant here for Jalen Davis, because he fought so hard to get his shot to start, only to maybe lose it with a four-game minimum stay on IR.

I might transcend the mundane and come out of my skull in the worst way if the Bengals coaching staff decides to kick Dax back inside and deploy rookie Tacario Davis on the perimeter. That's what happened by sheer necessity in Week 3. It wasn't pretty.

Tacario has a seemingly bright future, but he's straight up not ready. Did we not learn from playing Knight and Carter too much in 2025 (and arguably this year in Carter's case)?

On paper, Bralyn Lux doesn't seem like the safest or most sensible solution to the Bengals' sudden nickelback dilemma. They could look outside the building for an answer, such as Kenny Moore II off the Eagles' practice squad. But in terms of in-house solution, I'm all in on Lux — and have been since I predicted him to make the 53-man roster last August.

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