No NFL team wants to be in my annual column on squads that have started 0-2. The Giants launched a furious comeback from 21 points down to beat the Cardinals. The Broncos hit a Hail Mary with all zeros on the clock to set up a game-tying 2-point conversion against the Commanders, only to come up short. The Seahawks drove downfield on the opening drive of overtime against the Lions and scored a walk-off touchdown, even if it required a little hold of Aidan Hutchinson on the way. Teams don't want this sort of attention.
Starting 0-2, of course, means a team already is in a desperate situation before the weather has even begun to chill. Since 2002, roughly one in 10 teams has started 0-2 and advanced to the postseason. When the Bengals pulled off the feat last season, they became the first franchise to start 0-2 and make it to the postseason since 2018.
If a team loses again and drops to 0-3, though, desperate becomes hopeless. Since 2002, 99 teams have started 0-3. Just one of those teams (the 2018 Texans) has made it to the playoffs. The NFL now has a 14-team bracket, which would have added a second team (the 2013 Steelers) to the mix, but you get the idea. Starting 0-2 is bad. Starting 0-3 is all but unsurvivable.
As a result, the eight teams that started 0-2 these past two weeks are suddenly about to suit up for a playoff game in Week 3. Win and they can keep their season afloat. Lose and they're essentially out of the playoffs. In lieu of a warm vacation, they still have to keep suiting up for 14 more weeks of football.
Let's run through that list of eight 0-2 teams, discuss what has gone wrong and break down each team's chances of turning around its season. I'll start with the team that has the worst chance of becoming a contender and work my way down to the team that has the best chance of overcoming its slow start. That team was the Bengals in 2022. Are they back in that top spot again this season?
Jump to an 0-2 team:
Bears | Bengals
Broncos | Cardinals
Chargers | Patriots
Texans | Vikings
8. Houston Texans
The losses: at Ravens, vs. Colts
The Texans have not needed an excuse to be bad in recent years, but they have one amid their 0-2 start: injuries. During Sunday's loss to the Colts, they were without their starting safeties (Jalen Pitre and Jimmie Ward), both starting offensive tackles (Laremy Tunsil and Tytus Howard), their starting center (Juice Scruggs), and one of their two starting guards (Kenyon Green). During the game, they lost another safety (Eric Murray), while rookie quarterback C.J. Stroud played the entire game with a painful right shoulder injury. You can decide whether playing behind four backup linemen helped his shoulder improve.
Stroud already has taken 11 sacks in two weeks, which is an inauspicious start for a rookie quarterback in an organization that famously failed to protect its first franchise passer. Eleven sacks across a rookie's first two starts are the third most suffered by a quarterback since the turn of the century. No. 1 is former Houston passer David Carr, who took his 15 sacks on just 64 dropbacks in 2002. Stroud has dropped back 104 times for his sacks, but he plays in an era in which quarterbacks get taken down less often on the whole.
It's difficult to evaluate Stroud in a situation where most of his best offensive linemen have spent the season on the sideline. One positive has been his work out of quick game on throws under 2.5 seconds. There, his 71.6 QBR ranks 13th in the league and his 7.2 yards per attempt ranks sixth. One way to mitigate when the offensive linemen are all hanging out without you is to get the ball out before the defense can take you down.
New coach DeMeco Ryans doesn't have the superstars from his defense in San Francisco, but the former Texans linebacker has Will Anderson Jr. and an ability to create pressure. Houston's 32.3% pressure rate ranks seventh in the NFL. Anderson has a sack and three quarterback knockdowns in two games. Most of that pressure came against Lamar Jackson and the Ravens in Week 1 in a game in which Baltimore had its first-string offensive line on the field for most of the game before late injuries to Ronnie Stanley and Tyler Linderbaum.
Those are the positives. The negatives? The running game is averaging 2.5 yards per carry, the offense has scored one touchdown on seven trips inside the red zone, and the secondary can't stop anyone. Opposing quarterbacks are posting an adjusted completion percentage of 85.8% against Houston, a figure that removes throwaways and drops and adjusts for the depth of target. Only the Raiders have been less effective, and those two teams have posted the worst adjusted completion percentage marks allowed over the first two weeks of any season in the past decade.
The Texans weren't expecting to compete this season -- and they'll be better as they get healthier -- but if there was one game we were going to circle as a likely win on their calendar, it would have been at home against the Colts in Week 2. Despite Indianapolis quarterback Anthony Richardson leaving the game in the first half with a concussion, the Texans lost by 11 points and needed 10 points in the fourth quarter to get even that close. With their 2024 first-round pick on the way to the Cardinals at the end of the season, the Texans have nothing to tank for if they continue to lose. Until they get their offensive line back, it's tough to imagine them standing up to the likes of T.J. Watt in the weeks to come.
7. Arizona Cardinals
The losses: at Commanders, vs. Giants
If any team could be vaguely proud of getting off to an 0-2 start, it would be the Cardinals. Left for dead as a tanking team that might be paying more attention to USC's Caleb Williams than its own quarterbacks, Arizona has been feisty. The Cardinals gave the Commanders trouble in Week 1 before eventually falling short, then went up by three scores on the Giants on Sunday before coach Brian Daboll's team turned things around after halftime and pulled off a comeback victory.
Given that he was acquired just before the season and told the commentators he didn't know some of his receivers' and linemen's names in Week 1, quarterback Joshua Dobbs has done an admirable job under center. This hasn't been an explosive passing attack, but he is completing nearly 69% of his throws and hasn't yet thrown an interception. He did lose a fumble on a strip sack against the Commanders, but he has been an accurate passer and has run for three first downs, including a 23-yard scamper for a score against the Giants. He looked as if he was doing a better Daniel Jones impression than the $40 million man himself during the first half.
The short throws have led to an almost comical level of volume for tight end Zach Ertz, who has 18 targets through two games. Ertz has more targets than A.J. Brown, Ja'Marr Chase or Amon-Ra St. Brown through two weeks, which is a lot for a 32-year-old tight end coming off a serious left knee injury. He might end up as a candidate to be moved before the Halloween trade deadline, along with a potential power back in James Conner, who ran for 106 yards and a touchdown Sunday.
Coach Jonathan Gannon's defense has generally kept things unsurprisingly conservative. After a decade of blitzing at some of the highest rates in football, the Cardinals have sent extra pressure on just 7.2% of opposing dropbacks through two weeks, the league's lowest rate. They were able to generate free pressures against Jones in the second half, only for the Giants quarterback to elude them before making big plays.
Those big plays that Gannon's Vic Fangio-style defense is supposed to inhibit unfortunately popped up time and again for the Giants during that comeback. The Cardinals are allowing 11.6 yards per completion, which is the sixth-worst mark in football. Opposing quarterbacks have attempted five deep shots against them through two games, but three of those have been completed for 121 yards. You'll hear about this being an issue for another Fangio acolyte later in the column.
Would it have been nice to pick up a victory over a 2022 playoff team? Of course. In reality, though, the 2023 season for the Cardinals is more about sorting through the players on the roster and finding those who might end up playing valuable roles for 2024 and beyond. In that vein, the organization has to be happy with what it has seen from edge rusher Dennis Gardeck, who has three sacks in two games, and Kei'Trel Clark, who has been an every-down starter at cornerback as a rookie sixth-round pick. And hey: Williams has looked pretty good on Saturdays so far, too.
6. Chicago Bears
The losses: vs. Packers, at Buccaneers
You shouldn't be able to suck an entire offseason's worth of excitement out of a fan base in two games. The Bears didn't, but that's only because they were able to pull it off before Week 1 was even finished. A Chicago fan base expecting the Bears to take a big leap forward in 2023 saw the team lay an egg at home against the Packers in the season opener. Things were slightly better in Week 2, but they allowed Baker Mayfield to post one of the best games of his career in a 27-17 defeat.
The offense has been the bigger story. What was supposed to be an explosive, dynamic group built around the unique talents of Justin Fields has looked shoddy and undercooked. Fields is averaging a league-low 5.0 air yards per pass, seemingly in the hopes the Bears can get the ball out of his hands quickly and create easy completions. By NFL NextGen Stats data, there's some logic there; the Bears have a 71.7% expected completion percentage on their throws, which is the highest in the league.
The problem is they've actually completed only 60.6% of their passes; the resulting minus-11.1% completion percentage over expectation (CPOE) is the worst in the league among teams that have played two games. NextGen Stats credits Fields' receivers with just one drop through Week 2, so much of that CPOE issue seems to fall on the quarterback's shoulders. I would put a lot of the blame on the offensive architecture and consistency; there are just too many moments when one or two players on this offense blow or poorly execute an assignment and it blows up the entire play.
Fields has to do more as a passer. He doesn't look confident, which is understandable given what is going on around him but is extremely disappointing for a player in his third season. He has been late to make throws, has been slow to anticipate receivers coming open and has missed would-be completions too often in each of his first two games.
On the other hand, when he has been given permission to throw downfield, he's 5-of-6. The best offense for Fields would be one where he can try to hit big plays and use his legs as a runner, and that's curiously not what the Bears are doing. He has four designed runs in two games, one of which was a failed sneak attempt. The creativity of the quarterback run game that has helped Jalen Hurts in Philadelphia and Anthony Richardson in Indianapolis hasn't been present in the Chicago playbook.
It might not be an issue if the Bears were overwhelming teams on the ground, but with Luke Getsy's offense averaging 3.5 yards per designed rush this season, this has hardly been a dominant rushing attack. The playcalling has been confusing and invited criticism; Sunday's example was a screen thrown from inside the 5-yard line that produced a pick-six.
Matt Eberflus' defense, too, has yet to make major strides. Injuries cost it cornerback Kyler Gordon in Week 1 and safety Eddie Jackson in Sunday's loss, but Chicago has shown little ability to stop opposing offenses. Jordan Love carved the Bears up in Week 1, and Mayfield went 26-of-34 for 317 yards Sunday. The only reason this wasn't a bigger blowout was an excellent performance inside the red zone, where the Bears limited the Bucs to one touchdown on four trips and blocked a field goal attempt.
The Bears can't get off the field on third down, where they're allowing opposing teams to convert on 54.8% of their attempts. In part, that's because they can't get after the quarterback. While their pressure rate is average, they have just one sack in two weeks. Even that one was a coverage sack after Love held the ball for more than four seconds. They don't have the secondary to hold up without any pressure, especially as they deal with injuries.
Things feel significantly worse around this team than they did before the season. Chicago Tribune reporter Dan Wiederer described the building as "shaken and/or short on answers" after the blowout in Week 1. Defensive coordinator Alan Williams left the team after the opener for personal reasons and has no timetable for his return, putting more on Eberflus' plate. The strides this team was supposed to take after the offseason simply haven't been made.
Oh, and now they go play the Chiefs on the road in Week 3. Expecting a postseason trip from these Bears was probably too much too soon, but the hope was they could double their win total from their 3-14 season and look like a team about to break through in 2024. Right now, they look closer to their next rebuild.
5. New England Patriots
The losses: vs. Eagles, vs. Dolphins
Despite their start, there are positives for the Patriots through two games. They've done a much better job against two elite offenses than the other teams that have faced those offenses this season. Mac Jones has begun to look more like the quarterback we saw as a rookie than the one who cut an aggravated, overwhelmed pose for most of 2022. And like the Texans, the Patriots have managed to be competitive despite spending the season without multiple starting linemen in Mike Onwenu, Cole Strange, Riley Reiff and Trent Brown, each of whom has missed at least one of the first two contests.
All of that has added up to a team that has been close enough to stay competitive but not ever threatening enough to put a scare into opposing fans. Against the Eagles, the defense handed the offense two chances to try to win the game down five points in the fourth quarter. The offense lost 2 yards on the first drive, and while the second drive dutifully marched down the field, it stalled out around the 20-yard line and never got any closer.
On Sunday night, after the Patriots came up with a third-and-1 stop on a bobbled snap and Jason Sanders missed a 55-yard field goal, Jones and the offense got another chance to play the hero. Down seven with 2:14 to go, they picked up 25 yards before coming up short on fourth down, where a throw to Mike Gesicki short of the sticks produced an unlikely lateral to Strange, only for the offensive lineman to be tackled just ahead of the line to gain.
In those situations where the offense needs someone to get open and make a play, Jones simply doesn't have the players to do it. In Week 1, Jones was without nominal top wideout DeVante Parker. In Week 2, Parker returned, booting Kayshon Boutte out of the lineup after the rookie sixth-rounder played two-thirds of the snaps during the opener. JuJu Smith-Schuster, who wasn't on the field late against the Eagles, saw his role expand in Week 2 only because Demario Douglas fumbled in the first quarter and Belichick took the rookie sixth-round pick out of the lineup for the remainder of the game. (The Patriots failed to recover any of the three fumbles.)
Jones is never going to be a great deep thrower, but the Patriots don't have anybody who is going to scare opposing offenses downfield. He is 1-for-10 on passes traveling 20 yards or more in the air this season; the only passers with a worse QBR on deep throws are Joe Burrow and Zach Wilson. Coordinator Bill O'Brien has installed more empty looks for Jones, who has a league-high 23 dropbacks out of empty backfields this season. They're not working as of yet, as Jones has averaged 5.2 yards per dropback on those snaps.
The team's best offensive playmaker is lead back Rhamondre Stevenson, but the two-minute drill removes the threat of running the football, and the passing game isn't good enough to survive as a one-dimensional option. Stevenson has been slowed behind that injury-hit offensive line to begin the season, as his 27 carries have generated just 75 yards. Ezekiel Elliott, signed late to serve as Stevenson's backup, has 42 yards on 12 carries.
The Patriots are not built to play from behind, and they haven't led for a single second this season. It might just be that simple. After losing two home games, though, they now have a must-win game on the road against the Jets, who gave them trouble even when Wilson was their starter a year ago. There are some winnable games left for them in the first half, with home matchups against the Saints, Commanders and Colts to go with road trips at the Jets and Raiders. Without pulling a home upset in one of its first two games, New England probably needs to win four of those five games to hold on to its postseason hopes.
4. Minnesota Vikings
The losses: vs. Buccaneers, at Eagles
Close games giveth, close games taketh away. The team that went 9-0 last season in games decided by seven or fewer points has started this campaign, naturally, by losing two close ones to the Bucs and Eagles. The 34-28 final score in Philadelphia wasn't as narrow as it seemed. The Vikings were the team that made the task so hard because they fumbled four times and lost all four while failing to recover a fifth fumble by the Eagles. No team has won a game in which it lost four fumbles without getting one back from its opponents since 2003 (Rams).
In all, the Vikings have failed to recover any of the seven fumbles in their two games this season, six of which have been from their own offense. Say it with me: That's bad luck. If anything, they have been lucky the Bucs and Eagles turned those six giveaways into only one touchdown, thanks to some fortuitously timed defense by Brian Flores' Minnesota unit.
After a season in which Ed Donatell's defense often was criticized for playing passive and conservative football, Flores has come in and immediately raised the volume. The Vikings have blitzed on more than 49% of opposing dropbacks, more than double their 22.1% blitz rate from 2022. Last season, the Giants were the only team to blitz on more than 37% of dropbacks, which should indicate how aggressive Flores has been with sending extra men.
The problem is that it hasn't worked. Just 5.6% of Minnesota's blitzes have produced a sack; the league average is usually around 8.5% over a full season. Baker Mayfield and Jalen Hurts have gone 19-of-28 for 235 yards against those blitzes this season; the Vikings' 90.3 QBR against when blitzing ranks 27th in the NFL.
Perhaps the blitzes would be more effective if the Vikings had their ideal personnel on that side of the football. Edge rusher Marcus Davenport, signed to a one-year deal for $13 million in free agency, has played four defensive snaps over the first two weeks and left the loss to the Eagles after aggravating an ankle injury. The team's top two picks from the 2022 draft were defensive backs Andrew Booth Jr. and Lewis Cine; both have been active this season after battling injuries a year ago, but neither has played a defensive snap.
Linebacker Brian Asamoah, a third-rounder last year, has played 11 defensive snaps, while 2022 second-round pick Ed Ingram was a disaster at guard last season and hasn't gotten off to a great start this season. There are real concerns that general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah's first draft might be a total wash given how players have either performed poorly, suffered serious injuries or been unable to force their way onto the field.
Ingram was the weak link on a good offensive line a year ago, but injuries already are compromising Kirk Cousins' protection at the line of scrimmage. Center Garrett Bradbury missed the Eagles game with a back injury. Left tackle Christian Darrisaw suffered an ankle injury in Week 1 and wasn't able to suit up after aggravating the issue in warmups, even after backup Oli Udoh suffered a season-ending left quadriceps tear. The left tackle for Minnesota in the fourth quarter against the Eagles was David Quessenberry, who joined the team Aug. 30.
About the only thing this team has done at a high level so far is throw the football. If you can pick only one thing to be good at in the NFL, you should probably pick the passing game, but you typically want to bring something else along for the ride. Cousins is averaging 8.0 yards per attempt while posting a plus-5.5% CPOE, but he has fumbled three times and has thrown an interception in the red zone.
We've seen teams remain competitive while relying almost exclusively on their passing attack in years past -- some of the Drew Brees Saints teams come to mind -- but they were usually able to field a competent rushing attack. Minnesota's 30.8% success rate on the ground ranks 28th in the league. Running back Alexander Mattison has struggled in the primary role after taking over for the released Dalvin Cook, and there's no other back with significant experience on the roster.
The Vikings should improve. Their schedule alternates brutal matchups (the Chargers, Chiefs and 49ers) with easier ones (the Panthers and Bears) over the next month of the season. They'll stop fumbling as often and won't lose every one of the fumbles they drop over the rest of the season. In the NFC, nine wins might be enough to earn a playoff berth, and that's not an impossible ask of Kevin O'Connell's team.
At the same time, we have a lot of evidence that the Vikings weren't truly a 13-win team last season. They finished 28th in DVOA, shed veteran players this offseason, aren't getting much from their 2022 draft class and haven't been particularly lucky to start this season. Under that logic, it shouldn't be much of a surprise they are 0-2, and the odds might be against them turning things around and getting back in the playoff picture. Now, with both teams 0-2, they get the Chargers in a de facto playoff game.
3. Denver Broncos
The losses: vs. Raiders, vs. Commanders
No other 0-2 team has packed more highs and lows into its first two games than the Broncos, who finished Sunday's loss to the Commanders by completing a Hail Mary to extend the game before meekly coming up short on the 2-pointer they needed to force overtime. They have looked dominant for stretches and incompetent during others, a problem that seems difficult to resolve when it has come up in each of their first two games.
That starts under center. Sean Payton was brought in to fix Russell Wilson. Has he succeeded? Well, depends on when you watch. Wilson has had stretches in which he has looked sharp and decisive with the football. He looked like the Wilson of old when he fired off two moon shots to Marvin Mims for huge gains in the first half.
He also let the Commanders back into the game with a first-half fumble and second-half interception. Halftime has been the turning point for Wilson through the first two weeks. During the first half, he has averaged a league-high 10.3 yards per attempt, posted a plus-18.6 CPOE and produced a league-best QBR of 97.1.
In the second half? Not so much. Wilson's QBR has dropped to 16.9, which ranks 29th in the league, and that's even after the Hail Mary. He's averaging just 5.3 yards per attempt after the break and has taken six sacks on 47 dropbacks. Second-half Wilson has looked puzzled and has struggled to find open receivers. While he still has functional mobility to boot and scramble, his ability to make multiple defenders miss and scramble all around the field to extend plays does not seem to be on the table at this point of his career.
When a quarterback gets worse as the game goes along and struggles in the way Wilson has over the past two weeks, it's tempting to draw the conclusion that he has been successful during Payton's scripted plays and struggled when the script is over. I'm not sure that follows. For one, Payton could choose to script plays to begin the first and second halves, and there's been no bump after the break for Russ. The post-halftime drop-off is a trend worth monitoring here.
With better discipline and special teams, the Broncos might be 1-1 or even 2-0. Wil Lutz, one of the many former Saints whom Payton acquired over the spring and summer, missed a field goal and an extra point in the narrow loss to the Raiders. As for the penalties, I feel the need to make a list:
A slightly mistimed and premature touch of the opening kickoff of the season cost the Broncos a free shot at recovering an onside kick.
An unnecessary roughness penalty on Justin Simmons set up the Raiders with first-and-goal on a drive that ended with a touchdown.
Another unnecessary roughness penalty on Kareem Jackson handed the Raiders a new set of downs late in the fourth quarter. The Broncos never touched the ball again.
Against Washington, a holding call on offseason addition Ben Powers in the second quarter took a first down off of the table and got the Broncos off schedule; Wilson was strip-sacked by Jamin Davis on the next play.
A face mask penalty on Nik Bonitto turned what would have been a third-and-18 into a first down for the Commanders.
A brutal dirty hit by Jackson on a defenseless Logan Thomas in the end zone didn't prevent the Commanders tight end from scoring a touchdown, but it did get Jackson ejected.
An offside on third-and-13 gave the Commanders a free play, which Sam Howell converted for a 35-yard pass to John Bates.
A pass interference penalty on Pat Surtain, his second in two weeks, turned a second-and-15 into a new set of downs for the Commanders.
A holding call on Fabian Moreau took a sack off the table and extended a Commanders drive that was about to result in a punt.
The Broncos don't have the talent to overcome those mistakes. They've been undisciplined and sloppy on defense as well. Coordinator Vance Joseph unsurprisingly has his unit blitzing at the sixth-highest rate in football, but its 88.5 QBR allowed while blitzing is 26th in the NFL. Commanders offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy & Co. tortured Denver with screens, hitting five for a total of 88 yards.
Denver is better than its record, but that might not matter. When it opened up the schedule and saw that it faced the Raiders and Commanders at home to begin the season, anybody penciling in a potential rebirth and playoff appearance in 2023 put a circle around both those games as W's. Instead, the Broncos lost both. They do get the Bears and Jets after a road trip to Miami this week, but they follow the Jets game with two tilts against the Chiefs across the ensuing three weeks. Losing after going up 21-3 on the Commanders might haunt them if they start holding on to leads and are competing for a playoff berth in December.
2. Los Angeles Chargers
The losses: vs. Dolphins, at Titans
Of the eight teams on this list, you could probably make a strong case that the Chargers have actually played the best of the bunch. Their two losses have been by a combined five points. They've actually led in their games for a total of just over 66 minutes. If you were judging them based on their snap-to-snap performance, they would be something close to a .500 team.
NFL games aren't judged that way, of course, and the Chargers are 0-2 because they haven't been able to hold on to those leads. In Week 1, the Dolphins converted a third-and-10 to Tyreek Hill for 47 yards before another third-down conversion to Hill gave Miami a 36-34 lead with 1:45 left.
Sunday in Tennessee was more of the same. The Titans converted a third-and-4 to DeAndre Hopkins, adding in a roughing the passer penalty on oft-frustrating linebacker Kenneth Murray for good measure. A third-and-goal touchdown pass to Nick Westbrook-Ikhine gave the Titans the lead with 2:25 to go. Justin Herbert drove the Chargers back with a game-tying field goal -- and they won the coin toss to start overtime -- but the offense went three-and-out before an eight-play drive set up the game-winning kick by Tennessee.
As good as the Chargers' offense has been, they haven't been able to close out games in the fourth quarter. Their final drives of each loss have gone nowhere. They were 3-of-3 on fourth down Sunday, but they were just 2-of-14 on third down against a middling Titans secondary.
For a coach whose defensive style is built around encouraging quarterbacks to take checkdowns and preventing big plays, Brandon Staley's defense simply hasn't been able to keep things in front of it this season. It was one thing to have trouble against the Dolphins, but Staley's defense arguably did a better job against a healthy Tua Tagovailoa than anybody else a year ago. Tagovailoa looked like an MVP candidate against the Chargers in the opener.
When you allow Ryan Tannehill and the Titans to hit big plays, it's more noticeable. Tannehill made a 70-yard completion to Treylon Burks in the second quarter and a 49-yarder to Chris Moore in the fourth. He had two incompletions on deep throws, but one produced a roughing the passer penalty. Last week, the Dolphins isolated J.C. Jackson in coverage and got Hill more than 200 yards. This week, the Titans beat Asante Samuel Jr. for the big completion to Burks and Michael Davis, who rotates on and off the field with Jackson, on the pass to Moore.
The Chargers are allowing a league-high 10.3 yards per pass attempt. Of the 320 pass defenses that have lined up over the first two weeks of each of the past 10 seasons, L.A. ranks 309th by this metric. With the Vikings and their explosive passing attack on the way this week, this team can't survive if its cornerbacks can't hold up on the back end.
The next two weeks before an early bye in Week 5 are critical for Staley's team, which faces the second-toughest slate of opponents in football over the remainder of the season. Games against the Vikings and Raiders should be winnable matchups. Winning them both and making it to the bye at .500 would salvage a frustrating start. With the Cowboys and Chiefs looming afterward, anything less might see the Chargers at 1-5 through six games.
1. Cincinnati Bengals
The losses: at Browns, vs. Ravens
The good news for the Bengals is that Week 2 wasn't quite as bad as Week 1. The offense came out slow again, but Joe Burrow & Co. eventually showed signs of their usual selves. They produced three long possessions on four tries in the second half against Baltimore, including touchdowns in the third and fourth quarters on throws to Tee Higgins.
The problem has been, well, everything else. Cincinnati went three-and-out on each of its two drives in the first quarter and netted only a field goal on its lone drive in the second quarter. After the 27-24 loss, Burrow told reporters he aggravated his right calf injury, an issue that originally began in training camp.
Has the calf injury impacted the star quarterback? It's tough to say. Burrow was the league's No. 1 passer on the run (traveling 8 or more mph while throwing) last season, posting a 131.5 passer rating. This season, although his numbers on the run are down, he's still posting a 112.1 rating on the run while actually trying those throws more often.
As a scrambler, Burrow either hasn't had opportunities or hasn't trusted his ability to take them. Last season, he averaged just under 13 yards on the ground per game as a scrambler. This season, he has one scramble for 5 yards in two games. He also has been sacked less often when pressured this season, with his sack rate under duress dropping from 25% to 15%. With his off-target rate staying mostly static, I don't think it's the calf that has been a burden.
What has happened, though, is teams blitzing Burrow without any answers. He has been blitzed on nearly 53% of his dropbacks over the first two weeks and averaged a league-worst 2.1 yards per dropback against extra pressure. A year ago, his 7.8 yards per dropback against blitzes ranked second. Teams were loath to blitz him and get carved up in man coverage against Higgins and Ja'Marr Chase, but it has worked in 2023.
Perhaps out of a desire to protect Burrow, his favorite alignment from his time at LSU has gone missing. The Bengals have barely worked out of empty this season. In 2022, he threw a league-high 107 passes out of empty, averaging 7.6 yards per attempt and throwing five touchdown passes without a pick. The only quarterbacks who were better throwing out of empty backfields were Jalen Hurts and Tua Tagovailoa.
This season, Burrow has seven pass attempts out of empty for a total of 7 yards. Going back to college, spreading the field and letting him pick his favorite matchup has been his preferred way to play. Now, even after adding left tackle Orlando Brown Jr. this offseason, the Bengals have not been able to thrive out of empty while running it half as often as they did in 2022. It's unclear whether Burrow's calf injury will keep coach Zac Taylor from getting back to empty looks, but that's what's missing from Cincinnati's passing game right now.
The other big concern for the Bengals heading into 2023 was the play of their secondary, which was in transition after an offseason of change. Starting safeties Jessie Bates and Vonn Bell left in free agency, as did starting cornerback Eli Apple. Fellow starter Chidobe Awuzie was recovering from a torn ACL in his right knee.
While that secondary held up for most of the game against the Browns, the numbers haven't been great. When the Bengals have dropped seven and tried to win with coverage, it hasn't worked. Lou Anarumo's unit has allowed a 91.9 QBR in coverage without blitzing this season, the worst mark in football. A year ago, with Bates and Bell in the mix, the Bengals ranked eighth in the same category. Their pass rush has struggled to create sacks with four-man rushes in both 2022 and 2023.
The secondary still looks like a work in progress. Nick Scott, one of the safeties acquired to replace the incumbent duo, left Sunday's game with a concussion and didn't return. Awuzie, the team's top cornerback when healthy a year ago, hasn't been a full-time player this season. He was in coverage out of the slot for the game-winning touchdown Sunday on a Lamar Jackson fade to Nelson Agholor.
Last season, the Bengals were able to turn things around quickly, in part because their schedule wasn't tough. They got the Jets in Week 3, a Dolphins team that lost Tagovailoa to an early injury in Week 4 and three games against the NFC South before their Week 10 bye. They won all five of those games and then got white-hot after the break.
This season, the bye comes earlier, and the schedule again isn't harrowing. The Bengals get the Rams, Titans, Cardinals and Seahawks over the next four weeks. Sweeping the NFC West teams would be the easiest way for them to right the ship. Three wins from those next four games might be essential given what comes after the bye, in games against the 49ers and Bills. If Burrow gets hot, the Bengals will be fine, but they don't yet have the cohesion and smooth efficiency we've seen from them at their best.