For the Week 8 edition of Monday Night Football, we've got an old school AFC North rivalry as the host the .The Browns have lost four consecutive games after beginning the season 2-1, and are seemingly in danger of falling too far out of the playoff picture for them to be a factor over the second half of the season. The Bengals have won four of their last five after starting out 0-2 and looked like they were about to go on a run... but they lost to a hip injury and will now have to re-adjust to life without their star wideout for at least the next few weeks.Will the Browns get back on track, or will the Bengals keep rolling despite injury i sues? We'll find out soon enough. Before we break down the matchup, here's how you can watch the game.Date:Monday, Oct. 31|Time:8:15 p.m. ETLocation:FirstEnergy Stadium (Cleveland, Ohio)TV:ESPN|Stream:(try for free) Follow:Odds: Bengals -3, O/U 45 (courtesy of Caesars Sportsbook) We went deep on the of the Bengals' offense a few weeks ago, prior to their Sunday Night Football matchup against the . (Yes, Bengals fans, we know they have since gotten better. There's a reason we're mentioning the struggles. Just hang in there.) Here's an excerpt:Much of this backslide seems to stem from the maddening predictability of their offense. Cincinnati has some of the most extreme run-pa s
Seth DeValve Jersey splits when it comes to their quarterback's alignment that I can ever remember. This season, on plays where Burrow has aligned in shotgun, the Bengals have called a pa s play 78% of the time. When he's been under center, they've called a run pay 75% of the time. Such extreme divergence in play-calling allows opposing defenses to key in on just one play type, and shut it down.The average team has seen 29% of its under-center plays stopped at or behind the line of scrimmage this season, according to TruMedia. The Bengals have seen 35% of theirs stopped at or behind the line. The average team has gained 10
Kendall Lamm Jersey or more yards on 17.5% of under-center plays, while the Bengals have gained 10 or more yards on just 9% of theirs. Going by TruMedia's EPA-based succe s rate metric, only 38% of the Bengals' under-center plays have been positive, while the league average is 45.4%. Perhaps that's at least in part because opponents have stacked eight men into the box on 52% of Cincinnati's under-center snaps, considerably higher than the 47.6% league-average mark.Similarly, when operating out of shotgun, Cincinnati has a 41.6% succe s rate, with 38.4% of its plays gaining zero or negative yards and 22.1% gaining 10 yards or more. The league averages for shotgun snaps are 44.7% succe s, 35.5% of gains with zero or negative yards, and 21.6% of plays gaining 10 yards or more. Again, the Bengals are behind league average in almost every category, and you have to think that it is at least in part because defenses pretty much know what's coming based on whether or not Burrow is taking the snap from under center.Cincinnati has become much le s predictable since we wrote
Larry Ogunjobi Jersey that story, largely be abandoning its under-center offense altogether. (The below numbers don't account for situation, like with the Bengals kneeling and running out the clock late in recent games, which led them to go under center for a few extra plays.)WeekOpponentShotgun %Non-Gun %179.8%20.2%261.2%38.8%350.1%49.9%455.6%44.4%5Ravens88.1%11.9%696.3%3.7%780.3%19.7%This shift has brought with it a corresponding ma sive jump in pa s rate relative to expectations. , Cincinnati averaged a 2.2% pa s rate over expectation in Weeks 1 through 5. In Weeks 6 and 7, that figure spiked all the way to 22%, as the Bengals torched the Saints and Falcons defenses for 781 yards and six touchdowns through the air. Of course, the Bengals will now be without star wideout Ja'Marr Chase for an undetermined length of time after the receiver suffered a hip injury. His absence will obviously have a significant effect on Cincinnati's offense, especially its ability to throw the ball downfield, where he has been favorite target. The Bengals have the good fortune of sporting one of the best wide receiver trios in the NFL, so they can shift more of the workload onto and . Tight end figures to be more involved as well, while will presumably get more snaps on the perimeter acro s from Higgins while Boyd works in the slot.The Bengals should resist the temptation to suddenly go back to being a run-heavy team, though, because has been one of the most ineffective backs in the NFL so far this season and the offensive line is not positioning him for succe s. The Browns rank 27th in DVOA against the run and 28th against the pa s, according to Football Outsiders, so the Bengals should be able to find openings through the air even without Chase in the lineup.Cleveland bases its offensive attack around its ability to run the ball behind a strong offensive line. Key in that attack, obviously, is , who may well be the best pure runner of the football in the entire league. Among the 46 running backs with at least 50 carries so far this season, Chubb ranks fifth with a 5.87 yards per carry average, fifth with 4.05 yards after contact per rush, this with a 43.7% tackle-avoidance rate, and second in the share of his carries (15.1%) that have gained 12-plus yards, all despite facing eight or more men in the box on 28.6% of his totes, the seventh-highest rate among the same group of players, according to Tru Media. The Bengals have not been quite as strong against the run as the pa s so far this season, but they
David Njoku Jersey still rank inside the top 10 in DVOA in both areas, according to Football Outsiders. (Seventh against the pa s and 10th against the run.) Chubb will put a lot of pre sure on their linebackers and safeties to make one-on-one tackles at the second level, but Cincinnati's biggest area of succe s against opposing run games has been in taking away big gains. They rank fourth in open-field yards per carry, indicating that they're doing a good job of limiting explosives.Cleveland's pa s game will look a bit different this week than it has during the early portion of the season thanks to the absence of explosive tight end , who is dealing with a high ankle sprain. After catching just one pa s for seven yards back in Week 1, Njoku averaged 5.5 receptions for 68.5 yards acro s the Browns' next six games, stretching the field vertically for and both capitalizing on coverages rolled toward and drawing coverage away from Cooper on occasion. The Bengals have limited tight end production in the pa s game so far this season but Njoku is a different caliber of athlete than most tight ends. is more than capable of filling the role, but he's not the same type of threat.On the outside, Cooper and take the majority of the snaps, and they'll work against (Cooper's former Cowboys teammate who is having the best season of his career to date, allowing only 18 catches for 219 scorele s yards on 41 throws in his direction, according to Pro Football Focus) and . It would be smart of the Browns to direct most of their attention toward Apple's side of the field, as he is the far easier target to take advantage of. Being able to throw at Apple requires giving Bri sett enough time to do
Britton Colquitt Jersey so, and that entails finding a way to keep the likes of (15th in pre sure rate among 156 players who have rushed the pa ser at least 100 times) and (42nd) away from the quarterback. That's a tall task, but Cleveland is also 10th in opponent's pre sure rate so far this season, so their offensive line could be up to it.Prediction: Bengals 26, Browns 17
