Bengals face stark reality — and have a glimmer of hope — after 0-3 start

The last time Cincinnati Bengals center Ted Karras started a season 0-3 he was playing at Indianapolis Cathedral High School in 2010.

“Won the state championship,” Karras said. “Just got on a roll. Everyone buckled up.”

Buckle up, again, because the Bengals’ quest to claw out of the September malaise just got exponentially harder after Monday night’s 38-33 loss to the Washington Commanders. And this uphill climb won’t be passing through Center Grove or Lake Central High. It runs through the AFC North.

“We are in it now, fellas,” Karras said. “It’s time to rally ourselves out of it because it is still wide open for us. Obviously, it’s a little harder at 0-3, but the vision is open, the league is open.”

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He’s not wrong. There’s a vision. Hindsight would be 20/20 suggesting the loss to the Patriots looks like an even deeper gash after the latest one-possession loss.

History is hard to argue with here. There have been 165 teams to start the season 0-3 since 1990. Nine finished with a winning record. Four made the playoffs. They combined for one postseason victory.

The last team to pull off the feat was the 2018 Houston Texans, who ripped off nine straight victories after losing three one-score games to start the year. The last instance prior came from the 1998 Buffalo Bills.

The odds aren’t quite so long anymore with an extra game and extra playoff spot to offset the 2.4 percent playoff history.

To focus on more recent football, since those 2018 Texans, 21 teams have started 0-3. Only the 2021 Indianapolis Colts ended the year with a winning record (9-8).

The Bengals can be different, though. Right? They have Joe Burrow — playing notably well — so that does separate them from the vast majority of aforementioned teams.

Heck, Cincinnati was 1-3 after their first four games last year and rebounded to stabilize to prime position before Burrow popped his wrist ligament Nov. 16 in Baltimore.

Burrow and the offense played at a league-best level for the second straight week but were overshadowed by the defensive disaster. Even with an ugly Week 1, they still rank in the top quarter in nearly every important offensive category.

• Points/drive: 4th (2.72)
• Success %: 2nd (54.4%)
• Explosive %: 20th (10.1%)
• Red zone %: Tied for 15th (50%)
• EPA/play: 4th (0.11)
• Adjusted net yards/attempt: 8th (7.01)

This offense can carry them. It’s doubtful they will look like the machine that carved up Washington on Monday night every week, but that’s always been the formula. Ranking fourth in points per drive and EPA/play right now should be the equivalent of the Alonzo Mourning GIF that spots the bright side of a discouraging moment.

In the last three years, 19 of the 21 teams to finish in the top six of either EPA/play or points/drive made the postseason (the 2022 Detroit Lions and 2021 Los Angeles Chargers were the outliers and both were a game away). That includes 10 of the 12 conference championship game participants.

If the offense hums, the wins will come.

The Bengals have eight games until their mid-November bye. If they can reset and carve a path to going 6-2 or 5-3 over that span, they would be positioned around .500 for the December stretch run when they have traditionally played well. Burrow has gone 13-2 from December forward dating to 2021. His only losses were the AFC Championship Game and Super Bowl LVI.

Nobody is saying it’s impossible. The schedule is still littered with teams facing similar issues. With a healthy Burrow comes hope, but there’s a razor-thin margin for error.

Teams rarely put together a run necessary to dig out of the abyss because of the same problems that got them in the hole in the first place. Talk about a manageable schedule all you want, the Bengals have lost twice through the first three weeks of the season to teams that earned a top-five draft pick, selected a quarterback and hired a new coach. Both at home. Both while favored by at least 7 points.

They did so being dreadful on offense in one of the games and historically dreadful on defense in another.

Does that sound like a team ready to pounce on a weak schedule? It sounds more like a team that should be extremely nervous about new coach Dave Canales, Andy Dalton and the Carolina Panthers.

“We’re by no means out of it,” Burrow said. “Playoffs and winning the division is the furthest thing from my mind. We have got to get better this week.”

If you thought the 0-3 numbers were bleak, try on 0-4.

This century, 72 teams have started a season 0-4. Two finished with a winning record. None made the postseason. None finished with a positive point differential.

“We can’t start looking down the road. There are 14 games left. We got to get ourselves in the dance right now,” Karras said. “We got to go beat Carolina.”

(Photo: Sam Greene / Imagn Images)