The Cincinnati Bengals have gotten some major performances by star players.
Basic numbers from the team’s wild card win over the Las Vegas Raiders and divisional round win over the Tennessee Titans say as much.
So do the advanced metrics.
Over at Pro Football Focus, these are the five highest-graded offensive players over those games:
- QB Joe Burrow — 86.2
- WR Ja’Marr Chase — 80.6
- TE C.J. Uzomah — 69.1
- RB Joe Mixon — 61.2
- OT Jonah Williams — 61.1
And these are the five highest-graded defenders:
- S Jessie Bates — 90.2
- DT D.J. Reader — 75.9
- CB Mike Hilton –73.8
- LB Germaine Pratt — 71.1
- S Vonn Bell — 70.8
Fans will notice the trends — most of the team’s biggest additions through the draft and/or free agency pop up here. They also happen to be guys that came from winning programs and are majorly responsible for the culture change, so it isn’t surprising they’re playing so well under the biggest spotlight.
We could nitpick, like D.J. Reader’s grade being way too low given his impact against Derrick Henry and the Titans. But truth is, these are the names the Bengals expected to perform the best and the result so far is two playoff wins with potentially more to come in the coming weeks.
