It feels like now-or-never time for the Cincinnati Bengals as they start the season with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in town.
Those Bengals went all-in this offseason, leaving a historical comfort zone by spending big, doing modern things with contracts and making blockbuster trades. All in the name of winning around Joe Burrow, of course.
The task at hand starts with Baker Mayfield and the Buccaneers, an eight-win club from a year ago hoping that it’s on a rise of its own.
There are small concerns for the Bengals. The defensive rebuild under Al Golden needs to work. It got a serious infusion with the likes of Dexter Lawrence, Jonathan Allen and others, but now is the time to start proving the unit can actually pull its own weight.
Concerns exist on the
offense, too. Burrow and the weapons are elite, but the shaky-looking under-center stuff from preseason action can’t be a sign of things to come: They need to prove his historically shaky stuff from those formations won’t bleed into this season.
Health, at least, isn’t a major concern. Shemar Stewart was the only name on the final injury report and even he avoided what appeared to be a season-ending injury near the start of camp.
As for the Bucs, Mayfield remains a threat and he has some great weapons on offense too with wideouts Emeka Egbuka and Chris Godwin in the wake of the Mike Evans era ending.
The Bengals don’t really blink at elite opposing wideouts these days, though, not after DJ Turner’s breakout last year and his spending all summer trailing Ja’Marr Chase all over the field. The defense should be unpredictable enough at home to keep Mayfield unsettled.
Maybe the Bengals don’t look like they fully shake the slow-starter reputation here, but there’s a reason most experts pick the Bengals to win this one.
Prediction: Bengals 28, Buccaneers 20
This article originally appeared on Bengals Wire: Final score predictions for Buccaneers vs. Bengals in Week 1
