As with most things Bengals, any good news comes tinged with regret and larded with reality. Joe Burrow’s return for the Thanksgiving night game in Baltimore is of course welcome. Regardless of circumstances, getting to watch Joey Franchise play ball is not something we should blithely take for granted. That should be obvious, especially given his injury history, though many Bengal fans want him encased in bubble wrap and packed away like Halloween decorations until next year.
But after Sunday’s morale-boosting but ultimately still painful 26-20 loss to New England, the Bengals are all but eliminated from the postseason for the third straight year. At 3-8, they’re somehow not technically out of it, but their odds are longer than the holiday drive to Grandma’s house. Over at FTN Fantasy, we put their playoff chances at a resounding 1.6%. Still better than their chances of picking first in the draft, 0.6%, but not by much. Their odds at selecting in the top five, by the way, are considerably better at 16.4%.
What makes it teeth-gnashing of course is that the AFC North is eminently winnable while Cincinnati has let so many games slip away like sand through their hands. Sunday was yet another example. The bedraggled defense played one of its best games of the season, contributing a pick-six and two mighty goal line stands and holding supposed MVP candidate Drake Maye to a single touchdown drive. Granted, the bar is low, as the defense remains the worst unit of the DVOA era through 11 games—but there was noticeably good play by several guys written off as busts, including Myles Murphy, who finally seems to be coming around just in the nick of time to save his career if not impact the team’s fortunes.
The Bengals’ loss came down to playing the entire game without their three best players and the endgame without their fourth, Tee Higgins, lost to a scary-looking concussion late in the brutal game that saw multiple players on both sides exit with injuries. Higgins, remarkably, will likely miss the annual fixture in Baltimore for the fourth straight season.
Cincinnati is used to being without Burrow and Trey Hendrickson at this point, but Ja’Marr Chase being suspended was doubly damaging as the Bengals probably would have won if he played. That only makes his spitting incident somehow more painful and damaging than it already was, hard as that is to believe.
We’ve already discussed how the story of this season shoulda/woulda/coulda been Joe Flacco’s incredible emergency bailing effort, saving the 2025 campaign just when it hit an iceberg. Unsurprisingly, he’s been less effective these past two games, playing injured and, on Sunday, throwing to backups. He should go down in Bengals lore as the unlikeliest of heroes; instead, “The Other Joe” will sadly be a footnote in another lost year.
The Bengals are taking the most painful elements of the past two seasons and giving us an excruciating mashup. In 2023 the team was playoff and possibly Super Bowl worthy, but Burrow’s injuries, including the calf strain that caused compromised play for a month and the season-ending wrist tear, prevented it. Last year, of course, Burrow was brilliant but the defense execrable. For 2025, we’ve gotten the worst of both worlds, a historically shoddy D and Burrow out for most of the year. Thanks, guys! It would somehow be appropriate if Burrow comes back to lead the team to six straight wins to finish 9-8 yet again and the Bengals to come up short of the playoffs once more.
Every miracle begins with a single prayer, and that begins with tomorrow’s Tryptophan Bowl in Bodymore, Murdaland. The Ravens, to absolutely no one’s surprise, have recovered from a terrible start as well, thanks mainly to Lamar Jackson’s injuries being far less severe than Burrow’s. Once 1-5, the Nevermores have ripped off five wins in a row to reach a tie atop the division. Since no one believes in Pittsburgh, rightfully so, it would appear the Ravens will somehow become the first team to capture the AFC North three straight seasons despite their nightmare start. Blurgh.
That hardly means they’re invincible. Baltimore’s defense has recovered from an awful start, in part due to tactical shifts that moved star safety Kyle Hamilton closer to the line of scrimmage in a hybrid-linebacker role and putting more traditional free safety Alohi Gilman in the starting lineup. (He’s in the role our guy Geno Stone played so well in 2023 that Cincinnati just had to have him.) Hamilton left Sunday’s game against the Jets with an ankle injury and is questionable for tomorrow—likely to play but perhaps not at his best. Obviously he is a terror bird who will need to be accounted for at all times, regardless of health.
Jackson is questionable as well, ironically with a toe injury, in his case a relative stubbing compared to Burrow’s surgery-required turf toe. The offense has been subpar as LJ has battled various leg ouchies. Jackson will play, of course—no chance he passes up a feast at the hands of his personal turkeys, the Bengals D.
Of course, the same applies for Burrow, who lit up the Ravens for 820 yards and nine TDs in the two meetings last year (losing both in a manner that defied imagination, of course). It’s no accident that he’s been targeting this game as a return date all along. Strange as it seems, he is more comfortable playing Baltimore, the Devil he knows, than a team like New England. Between Joe and Lamar, whomever’s toe holds out the longest should be victorious.
Nice as it would be to retire on Thanksgiving night to a Bengals win, their first since another Thursday night many moons ago against Pittsburgh, what would it really get the team? We can all see the 4-2 or 5-1 mini-rally to apply makeup to this particular pig coming a long ways down the tracks. A few wins might help get us through the holiday season, but come the offseason it would likely have a deleterious effect on the needed housecleaning, starting with the jobs of Zac Taylor, Al Golden, and Duke Tobin.
Social media has been awash with the fanciful notion that all three would be fired after the final game, when of course the far more likely outcome is all three remain in place for 2026. A Burrow-led strong finish would only enhance their death grips on those jobs, while also taking Cincinnati out of the running for a potential top defender come draft day, be it safety Caleb Downs from Ohio State or one of the many pass rushers on offer. They’d be right back in the mid-teens, picking someone whose college performance was lacking but whose potential is too great to pass on at that spot. (This is a recording.)
So enjoy the Return of Burrow whilst picking the remaining meat off the marrow and licking apple pie from your fingers. It will go down great in the moment, but we’ll have to face the bathroom scale in the coming weeks regardless.
Have a Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!
Robert Weintraub heads up Bengals coverage for Cincinnati Magazine and has written for The New York Times, Grantland, Slate, and Deadspin. He guests on Mo Egger’s radio show every Thursday in the 4 p.m. hour. Follow him on X at @robwein.
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