Those who are writing off the Bengals’ 2026 outlook are missing a pretty obvious point: this team is built differently now.
Cincinnati has the kind of continuity most of the AFC North doesn’t. Zac Taylor is the only head coach in the division who kept his job, while Mike Tomlin, John Harbaugh, and two-time Coach of the Year Kevin Stefanski were all on the way out.
That alone gives the Bengals an edge. Add in a major offseason of roster retooling, especially on defense, and it’s not hard to see why Joe Burrow and the locker room are feeling good about what’s ahead.
And yet the skepticism keeps coming. That’s the strange part.
This doesn’t look like a team trying to sneak into a wild-card spot. It looks more like a Super Bowl contender.
Robert Mays of The Athletic Football Show recently talked through Cincinnati’s outlook with ESPN+ analyst Aaron Schatz, and even while they pointed to a playoff return as a real possibility because of the schedule, the conversation came with a built-in shrug about how much the Bengals’ late-season surge should matter.
"Mays: The improvement in the back half of the year isn't necessarily an indication of what's going to happen in Cincinnati.
Schatz: Yeah, and the Bengals improved significantly in the back half of the year, but that's not part of our projection...Common sense says it should roll over. It doesn't."
“We have the Bengals returning to the playoffs.” @ASchatzNFL tells @robertmays why @FTNFantasy likes the Cincinnati Bengals to return to the postseason this year. pic.twitter.com/AlBRGHJiQj
- The Athletic Football Show (@TA_FootballShow) July 7, 2026
That’s where the argument starts to wobble. Cincinnati’s late run in 2025 didn’t happen in a vacuum, and it wasn’t some empty stat-padding stretch. The Bengals won five straight and still missed the playoffs by one game.
The context matters. The quarterbacks they faced in that run were Cooper Rush, Will Levis, Dorian Thompson-Robinson, rookie-year Bo Nix, and Russell Wilson in his fourth-to-last career start. That’s not exactly a brutal gauntlet.
Even so, the Bengals still had to do the work, and they did. They were also operating with a defense that hadn’t been meaningfully upgraded veteran-wise beyond T.J.
Slaton, while learning a new scheme under defensive coordinator Al Golden. Golden has already admitted he made the playbook too complicated early on.
On top of that, Cincinnati was forcing rookie linebackers Demetrius Knight Jr. and Barrett Carter into starting roles before they were ready. That’s a lot to ask.
It’s also why the offseason additions matter so much now. Dexter Lawrence, Jonathan Allen, Boye Mafe, and Bryan Cook give the Bengals a very different kind of defensive backbone.
The offensive line deserves the same kind of respect. Burrow gets all five starters back from 2025, and that group already showed what it could become. It had to climb out of a historically bad start in run blocking, watched Amarius Mims improve fast, and still finished as a legitimate top-tier unit even while the offense kept finding itself in obvious passing situations.
The run game and line took nearly two months to settle in, but once they did, Chase Brown started producing like a different back. He averaged just 2.7 yards per carry in the first six games of 2025, then jumped to 5.2 yards per carry from Weeks 7 through 18.
Pass protection followed the same pattern. The 2025 Bengals ranked 16th in Pass Block Efficiency, according to PFF, but over the final 11 weeks they were fourth best in that metric. They were 27th in Weeks 1-7 with a new offensive line coach and two rookies in the mix, then allowed just seven sacks over the final 11 weeks, which was fourth best.
A lot of that improvement came once Joe Flacco took over the offense. Burrow returned early from his turf toe injury and played well, but he didn’t get the full benefit of what the line had become.
That’s part of what makes the Bengals so intriguing now. Burrow is headed into what should be the best offensive line he’s ever played behind in the NFL. Brown isn’t being talked about like an elite running back, but he sure looked like one over that 11-game stretch.
And the progress wasn’t limited to a vague “second half” narrative. It covered about 65% of the schedule.
That’s not a small sample. That’s a real body of work.
Now the defense has to answer in kind, and it gets a second year in Golden’s system to do it. The new pieces should help.
Lawrence is one of the most dominant defensive tackles in the sport. Mafe just came from Seattle, where he played for Mike Macdonald.
Cook had to survive the complexity of Steve Spagnuolo’s Kansas City defense. Allen spent years dealing with dysfunction in Washington and still produced at a high level.
Golden doesn’t need to get cute. He doesn’t have to force the issue or reinvent anything.
He has veteran talent now, which means he can be less exotic and still run the concepts he wants. That wasn’t the case last year.
In Other News...
Bengals May Have Found A Receiver Story Fans Didn't See Coming
The Bengals have spent the offseason looking for any edge they can find at receiver, and one of the more interesting additions came from an unexpected place. Dohnte Meyers arrived after his time with the Saskatchewan Roughriders, where he worked through injuries and still managed to be part of a Grey Cup run, giving Cincinnati a player whose path to the NFL has already included plenty of adversity.
For a team always searching for reliable depth behind its top targets, Meyers is the kind of name worth watching once camp opens. His background suggests resilience and a willingness to keep pushing through setbacks, and that can matter as much as raw talent when a roster spot and a role are on the line. The question now is how quickly he can turn that kind of resume into something real in a crowded Bengals receiver room. [Read more 🡒]
Bengals Finally Have The Interior Force This Gamble Demanded
The Bengals spent a premium draft asset to get Dexter Lawrence, and the logic behind the move is easy to see. Even with a statistical dip in 2025 while playing through an injury, Lawrence still carries the kind of reputation that keeps him near the top of leaguewide conversations among executives, coaches and scouts, and Cincinnati clearly believes he can change the feel of its defensive front.
What the Bengals are buying is not just production, but gravity. Lawrence has long been the sort of interior force offenses have to account for on every snap, the player who can occupy multiple blockers and open up space for everyone around him. ESPNs 2026 preseason survey still placed him seventh among defensive tackles, a reminder that the league has not forgotten how disruptive he can be when healthy, and now Cincinnati is betting that reputation will translate into something bigger on its own line. [Read more 🡒]
National Analyst Just Put Bengals New Safety Duo In Elite Company
The Bengals spent part of the offseason trying to stabilize a defense that has too often carried too much of the load, and the addition of Bryan Cook was one of the more direct moves in that effort. Cook arrived from Kansas City on a three-year deal after finishing his rookie contract, giving Cincinnati a proven veteran to pair with Jordan Battle as the secondary tries to take a real step forward in 2026.
Sports Illustrateds Matt Verderame took notice, slotting Cook and Battle among the leagues best safety tandems and putting Cincinnati in the same conversation as some of the NFLs most established back-end groups. Battles heavy workload and production last season already gave the Bengals a foundation, and Cooks championship background adds another layer of credibility, but the bigger question is whether the pairing can turn that recognition into the kind of defensive consistency that helps push Cincinnati back into the playoffs. [Read more 🡒]