The Bengals march to Super Bowl 61 starts Thursday night. Yes, I know. It’s preseason. I’m usually the guy telling everybody else not to lose their minds over an August football game. But when the Bengals take the field Aug. 13 against the Detroit Lions, I’ll be watching a little more closely than usual. More: Cincinnati Bengals release first depth chart of 2026-27 season The most important thing is that the Bengals finish the game healthy. And while the final score will mean absolutely nothing, this game should give us our first look at whether everything we’ve been hearing about these Bengals all offseason is real. Because make no mistake: Big expectations are back in Cincinnati. And they should be. Bengals spent big to fix what was broken
The Bengals knew what sank them last season. Their defense was awful. So instead of nibbling around the edges, Cincinnati attacked the problem, bringing in talent across a defense that desperately needed it. Nobody symbolizes that commitment more than Dexter Lawrence. The Bengals paid a steep price to get arguably the best defensive tackle in football because they desperately needed somebody capable of wrecking a game from the middle of the defensive line. Lawrence has reportedly been doing exactly that during training camp. That’s encouraging. But as Lawrence’s new linemate Jonathan Allen recently put it, none of this really matters until they do it on game day. We’ve heard enough about potential, good practices and how much better everybody looks in shorts and shoulder pads. Show me. We won't see the Bengals' new-look defense at full strength, with starting defensive backs Dax Hill and Bryan Cook expected to sit. Still, against Detroit's second-team offense, there's no excuse for anything less than a stout showing − even in limited snaps. I want to see Lawrence collapse the Lions' pocket. I want to see pressure without having to blitz everybody from Covington to Columbus. I want to see linebackers flying to the football. I want to see defensive backs contesting passes instead of chasing receivers into the end zone. The Bengals spent money and draft capital to fix this defense. Thursday night is our first glimpse at whether they got their money’s worth. And as Burrow said earlier this offseason, pressure has a way of revealing people. We’re about to find out who rises to it. The doubting of Joe Burrow should fuel him
Which brings me to No. 9. Apparently, there are still people who need convincing that Joe Burrow is elite. I’m not one of them. Burrow is a top-three quarterback in the NFL. Period. Yet I hear the criticism. He’s overhyped. He benefits from having Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins. He’s still living off that Cinderella Super Bowl run from the 2021 season. He gets hurt too much. An elite quarterback doesn’t miss the playoffs three consecutive seasons. I’ve heard it all. And, as a Bengals fan, it burns me up. More: Joe Burrow falls from top 10 in NFL Top 100 reveal I know Burrow hears it, too. Players love to tell us they don’t pay attention to outside noise. Maybe they don’t sit around scrolling through every quarterback ranking on social media. But come on. They know. Burrow knows where people rank him. He knows what people say about his injuries. He knows people are wondering whether that magical run to Super Bowl 56 and the AFC Championship Game appearance the next season represented the beginning of something special or the high-water mark of his career. Good. I hope he remembers every word. Because if these Bengals are going to contend for the Super Bowl this year, I believe we need the best Joe Burrow we’ve ever seen. Burrow enters the season 48 touchdown passes away from passing Andy Dalton for the Bengals’ career record. When told the number this offseason, Burrow had a one-word response: “Doable.” I agree. In fact, I’ll go further. I think the Bengals might need something close to it. Burrow threw a franchise-record 43 touchdown passes in 2024, and the Bengals still missed the playoffs. Give me five more. Give me 48 touchdowns, a division championship and a healthy No. 9 walking into the postseason. Because we’ve seen what happens when Burrow gets there. But none of this matters if he doesn’t stay upright. Protecting No. 9 must become Cincinnati’s obsession
Let’s not dance around it. If Burrow goes down, the Bengals’ Super Bowl hopes go down with him. I love and respect Joe Flacco and everything the man did last season and has accomplished during his long NFL career. But Cincinnati’s championship hopes ride on the right arm of Joe Burrow. That means protecting him must be priority No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3. Opinion: I give the Bengals a 'D' for not protecting Burrow in draft And some of that responsibility belongs to Burrow himself. Sometimes the smartest play is throwing the ball into the third row. Sometimes discretion really is the better part of valor. Burrow’s competitiveness is part of what makes him special. He hangs in the pocket because he believes he can make one more play. He scrambles because he believes he can steal another first down. But there comes a point when your value to the franchise has to override your desire to squeeze something out of a busted play. Get down. Throw it away. Live for the next snap. Burrow missed nine games last season because of injury. Across the past three seasons, he has played in only 35 of a possible 51 games. At some point, you have to wonder what another major injury would take out of him, not only physically but mentally. We’ve seen talented quarterbacks such as Andrew Luck decide their bodies had absorbed enough punishment. I never want to see Burrow reach that point. In a recent interview with CBS Sports, Burrow said he "has a long career ahead" of him. I pray he's right, and that all of those years are here in Cincinnati.
The coaching staff has a role in protecting him, too. Run the football effectively. Avoid obvious third-and-long situations. Design plays that get the ball out of Burrow’s hands quickly. Make defenses respect something besides Chase, Higgins and Burrow dropping back 40-plus times. But ultimately, five big men standing in front of him may determine how far this team goes. The Bengals are bringing back all five starting offensive linemen from last season. There is reason for optimism: Cincinnati allowed 36 sacks in 2025 and finished tied for 10th in sack percentage, its first top-10 finish in that category since 2014. More: ESPN's Tim Hasselbeck slams Bengals' organization, Joe Burrow's health Left tackle Orlando Brown Jr. has pushed back on some of the criticism of this unit, and I think some of that criticism can be unfair. But here’s the problem: Good isn’t good enough anymore. Not this year. If Burrow needs to have his best season, this offensive line needs to have its best season, too. Football is still won in the trenches. The Bengals clearly understood that, on defense, they needed to invest heavily in Lawrence and a remade front. Now the offensive line has to respond. Maybe continuity helps. Maybe another year together makes communication sharper. Maybe iron really is sharpening iron every day in practice as this offensive line battles Lawrence, Allen and a vastly improved defensive front. Whatever it takes. Protect No. 9. If this starting offensive line struggles against Detroit's second string, that's concerning. Enough what-ifs. This Bengals team must deliver
There is always excitement for Bengals fans this time of year. But this year, for me, there’s also anxiousness. Because I know how quickly things can turn. The 2021 season was magical because nobody saw the Bengals coming. Every week felt like we were playing with house money until Cincinnati suddenly found itself in the Super Bowl. And through that playoff run, the Bengals rallied around a simple question: Why not us? It became more than a slogan. It captured the swagger of a team too young, too confident and maybe too stubborn to understand all the reasons it supposedly couldn't win. The 2022 season proved 2021 wasn't a fluke. The Bengals went back to the AFC Championship Game and came within a few plays of returning to the Super Bowl. They belonged. They were contenders. And then came three seasons of heartbreak. Three straight postseasons watching somebody else play. For three years, Bengals fans kept asking, "Why not us?" Unfortunately, the answer was always disappointing. Because Burrow got hurt. Because the defense couldn't stop anybody. Because the Bengals started too slowly and spent the rest of the season digging out of a hole. Because the offensive line couldn't always protect the most important player on the field. Because in the NFL, talent alone doesn't make you a champion. The past three seasons have given us plenty of reasons why not. But this offseason has given fans reasons to believe again. This is supposed to be a championship-level football team. So be one.
Prove that all the money spent fixing this defense mattered. Prove that bringing back the offensive line intact was the right decision. Prove that Burrow, Chase and Higgins can still carry the most explosive offense in football. Prove that the championship window Bengals fans have spent the past three years worrying was closing is actually wide open. Thursday night against Detroit won’t tell us whether the Bengals are going to Super Bowl 61. Nobody wins the Lombardi Trophy in August. But journeys have beginnings. Why not us? No reason at all.
Opinion and Engagement Editor Kevin S. Aldridge is a diehard Bengals fan and can be reached at kaldridge@enquirer.com. On X: @kevaldrid. This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Bengals have the talent. Now go prove the doubters wrong | Opinion