CINCINNATI -- There's still about three months until the start of the regular season.
Still, it isn't too early to start previewing the Cincinnati Bengals' year by looking at the past and seeing how they fared against the teams they will be facing. Whether they last saw their upcoming opponents one year ago or four, and whether they faced them in the regular season or in the playoffs, there could be something to learn from those meetings.
We began with the first team on the Bengals' 2015 schedule, the Oakland Raiders. Next came the San Diego Chargers. Next came the Baltimore Ravens. Now, we continue with team No. 4, the Kansas City Chiefs.
In their most recent outing against the Chiefs, the Bengals put together one of their more complete games in recent seasons. Good defense and balanced offense aided them in a blowout:
KANSAS CITY CHIEFS
Date of 2015 meeting: Oct. 4, in Cincinnati
Chiefs' 2014 record: 9-7
All-time series: Bengals lead 14-13
Last time Bengals faced Chiefs: Cincinnati won, 28-6, on Nov. 18, 2012
How the game was won: Andy Dalton, BenJarvus Green-Ellis, Cedric Peerman and a suffocating pass defense powered the Bengals in the 22-point rout. A case could be made that this win was more impressive -- from a defensive standpoint -- than any the Bengals had last year. Why? Because they actually had a pass rush in this game. Four Bengals were credited with a sack. All four are still on the team, too: Geno Atkins, Michael Johnson, Rey Maualuga and Adam Jones. Only twice last season did the Bengals collect three sacks in a game. So it wasn't too surprising they ranked last in the NFL in sacks with 20 and were slapped with Pro Football Focus' worst pass-rush grade.
What also helped the Bengals in this lopsided win was their balanced offensive production. Dalton passed for 230 yards and two touchdowns while he and Green-Ellis and Peerman combined to rush for 189 yards. Green-Ellis had the bulk of those yards, carrying 25 times for 101 yards. It was one of four 100-yard games he had that year. In 2013, neither he nor Giovani Bernard had any.
This year's key storyline: Much has changed in the receiving department for the Chiefs, who no longer have Dwayne Bowe. The former first-rounder signed with the Browns during free agency this year. He was replaced by former Eagles receiver Jeremy Maclin. It will be interesting to see how well he gets along this season with quarterback Alex Smith, specifically so early in the season. Kansas City visits Cincinnati in Week 4. A better pass rush could be key for this game. As poorly as the Bengals got to opposing quarterbacks last year, they are expecting Atkins to play much like he did during his Pro Bowl campaign in 2012, and they believe Johnson's return from a year away will jolt some new life into a defensive line that sorely needed him last year.