4 winners, 4 losers in Bengals' much-needed Week 5 win vs. Cardinals
- Winners: Chase and Hendrickson
- Losers: Jalen Davis
Losers
Offensive Line
It was another rough outing for the o-line, as they surrendered three sacks on Joe Burrow. It was clear early on that the Cardinals were taking the same approach that the Titans did the week before where they were going to blitz right through the middle of the o-line until they showed they could stop it.
Arizona learns its lesson from first two drives and finally brings the blitz up the middle on third down.
— Paul Dehner Jr. (@pauldehnerjr) October 8, 2023
Just like last week in Tennessee, #Bengals can't handle it.
Untimely three-and-out.
What helped them out this week was that Burrow was more mobile and able to get away from the pressure, which he couldn't do a week ago. Still, it's clear that the Bengals are going to need to look for an upgrade at left guard next offseason because Cordell Volson has struggled.
Run Defense
If I had told you that James Conner would exit the game early on with an injury, you'd probably think that the Bengals run defense would be better this week than they were a week ago, right?
Well, that wasn't the case. Conner rushed for 46 yards before he exited the game but the Cardinals rushing attack finished with 142 yards and a touchdown off of 22 carries. The Bengals defense lucked out that the offense finally got things going and the Cardinals couldn't keep running the ball down their throats because we saw how that worked out for this unit last week.
The run defense has to get better or teams won't hesitate to run on them until they show they can stop it.