Breaking out:Tee Higgins- face career ending injury out for 2 years resignation letter to Bengals….
Breaking out:Tee Higgins- face career ending injury out for 2 years resignation letter to Bengals….
This is the second of a four-part series analyzing every angle of the Cincinnati Bengals’ future with free-agent receiver Tee Higgins and running mate Ja’Marr Chase. We lay out the truth of all discussion points from club, player and analytical angles leading up to the franchise tag deadline on March 5 as Cincinnati plots the next phase of the Joe Burrow era.
• Part 1, Tuesday: Understanding the ramifications
• Part 2, Wednesday: The primary weapon and asterisk of availability
• Part 3, Thursday: The Chase extension and trends of paying two top WRs
• Part 4, Friday: What they should do, what they will do
Upon asking Bengals coaches and staffers after the season whether they knew how many snaps Ja’Marr Chase, Tee Higgins and a fully healthy Joe Burrow played together during the 2023 season, the answer ranged from an eye roll to a laugh to sending an actual spreadsheet already in their system.
In so many ways for the coaching staff and those tasked with assessing what makes the roster tick, this number summed up their proper view of the state of the Bengals.
Extract the first four weeks of the calf injury that turned Burrow into a shell of himself and, of course, the wrist injury that ended his season in Baltimore. Then drop in a hamstring injury to Higgins in the middle of the season, taking him out of two games. The Bengals were left with three games against the Seattle Seahawks, San Francisco 49ers and Buffalo Bills with the full complement of their three-headed destroyer.
They won all three, the last two handily. A deeper look at the 121 snaps tells an even more convincing story.
Oh, yeah, breaking news, Dehner: These guys are good.
