Typically, when a team puts up 42 points on offense, that should be enough for that team to win the game more often than not. That was not the case for the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday, who did indeed score 42 points but failed to win the game due to their defense absolutely crapping the bed.
It's beyond frustrating for the offense to give the effort they did and the defense continuing to not do their part. Forty-two points should be enough to win a game but now, in back-to-back weeks, the Bengals offense has done their job and given the team a chance to win while the defense has done the complete opposite.
It doesn't look as though things are going to improve either. When asked about the defense and if there's any hope toward fixing it, head coach Zac Taylor's answer didn't exactly give fans confidence.
"We're going to do everything we can to find a way," Taylor said after the team's 47-42 defeat to the Chicago Bears. "I think it's impossible for me to say 'yes or no.' We've been trying everything we can so we'll just keep working at it."
Zac Taylor’s painful comment says it all about Bengals defense
This really sounds like a lot of word salad and fans are frustrated with this kind of attitude too. The Bengals knew their defense was in rough shape yet didn't do enough to overhaul it this offseason, instead opting to pay all of their offensive stars.
At this point, it's not surprising to see the unit continuing to struggle and it's gotten well past the point of the offensive players hiding their frustrations. Chase Brown and Ja'Marr Chase couldn't hide their disgust with their defensive teammates following the game and this is only going to get worse the longer this goes on.
While the Bengals are still theoretically in the running to win the AFC North, the back-to-back losses to inferior opponents squashed any real hopes of that actually happening. As long as the defense is performing this poorly, the Bengals are going nowhere this year.