The major Bengals storyline that could change everything in Week 1

When the Cincinnati Bengals hit the field in Cleveland for Week 1's duel against the Browns on Sunday, they'll have a chance to avenge their myriad early-season follies of yesteryear.

More than a chance, really. The Bengals are heavy road favorites for this AFC tilt, which feels like a trap of Admiral Ackbar-galactic proportions. A Week 1 home loss to the Patriots last year ultimately cost Cincinnati a shot at the playoffs. Quite traumatizing. Still probably too soon to bring up. Oh the pain.

Anyway, beyond some of the more individual-centric matchups that will define the game within the game in this Battle of Ohio, there's one macro narrative I'll be eyeing most closely.

Unproven Bengals secondary looms large vs. pass-happy Joe Flacco

Hat tip to Joe Goodberry for this stat: The Browns and Bengals led the NFL last season in pass rate, with Cleveland at 65.03% and Cincinnati at 64.81%.

That only helped support an initial data point I dug up for this article that, quite frankly, blew me away. When Joe Flacco had his renaissance of sorts in leading the Browns to the playoffs down the stretch of the 2023 campaign, he made five starts and one more in the postseason.

Guess how many pass attempts Flacco averaged across those six appearances? Nearly 42 per game.

Part of the reason Cleveland had to air it out so much last year was a function of being an awful overall team, trailing often, and being forced to play catch-up. Not quite the paragon of excellence that is the Bengals' Joe Burrow-orchestrated passing attack.

Not gonna lie, with a suspect Cincinnati pass rush outside of Trey Hendrickson, the Bengals' defensive backfield will be leaned on heavily to hold up in coverage. Although the Browns don't boast a bunch of world beaters at wide receiver anywhere near the caliber of Ja'Marr Chase or Tee Higgins, Flacco can still absolutely spin it, even at 40 years old.

Cam Taylor-Britt has legit CB1 upside, yet he was benched multiple times during an embattled 2024 campaign. Seems like CTB had a fine training camp, but we'll have to see how that translates once the real games begin. Anything else is mere speculation.

DJ Turner has a high ceiling thanks to sub-4.3 speed and resultant ability to make up ground in a hurry if he's initially beaten. However, Turner suffered a broken clavicle in Week 11, and has struggled with overall consistency.

Then we have Dax Hill, the former first-round pick once thought to replace Jessie Bates at safety, who'll begin 2025 as the starting nickel corner. Hill's versatility is something of a curse, and before he tore his ACL early last season, he flourished as a boundary cornerback. Hopefully he's up to snuff in the slot. We just don't know yet.

Oh, and speaking of safeties — a thin position group who could really use somebody like Bates — Geno Stone and Jordan Battle tied for 83rd among 98 qualifiers in PFF's defensive grades from 2024.

PFF isn't the end-all, be-all for player performance, yet it provides a decent-enough proximity to what's happening on the field.

While I'm confident that Burrow and the Bengals can win a shootout in Cleveland, it's not going to be easy. The Browns are dangerous in the sense that they have nothing to lose, and Flacco is playing with house money at this point in his career. He's going to let it rip and attack this Bengals secondary with everything he has to stave off the likes of Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders getting any action in the coming weeks.

Based on recent history, cautious optimism and trust in the development of Cincinnati's defensive back youth movement is about all Who Dey Nation should hang their hats on entering Week 1. Once Al Golden opens up that defensive playbook, the hope is there will be some exotic wrinkles that lead to takeaways and position the pressure-cooked DBs for success.

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