Cincinnati Bengals offensive tackle Orlando Brown Jr. has been under some serious heat to start the season.
In a fun twist, it’s Joe Burrow rushing to stand in front and protect Brown.
With his Bengals at 2-0, Burrow fielded questions during his weekly presser and made a point to defend Brown from some of the online criticism making the rounds.
"I think Orlando was pretty good (in Houston). There were a couple of sacks that weren't in his control at the end of the day," Burrow said, according to Geoff Hobson of Bengals.com. "There are a lot of different things that go into pass protection that's not just on the offensive line…That's what you don't see in the media. There's very intricate details of pass protection. A guy expecting help here, a guy expecting help from
a different spot. A lot of different things go into it that we would never explain to you guys."
Online and social media spaces tend to overly highlight Brown’s struggles at times. It’s notable when he had a bad rep in the preseason or over the first two games of the regular season. At times, it’s almost similar to only thinking about cornerbacks when they surrender touchdowns in coverage.
With Brown, he’s always been a bit of a streaky player who tends to struggle with speed rushers. His start to the season has been far from perfect, but his general body of work has always been above average. And when every offensive line tends to struggle against the Houston front seven, it’s hard to overreact much to the Week 2 happenings.
Plus, like Burrow says, only the guys in the building know who really deserves the blame on sacks and pressures most of the time.
And in Cincinnati, specifically, Bengals fans know all too well just how much worse offensive tackle play can get, so it’s probably especially nice to see Burrow using his platform to defend his guys.
This article originally appeared on Bengals Wire: Joe Burrow refreshingly comes to defense of embattled Bengals teammate
