Regular season grades for every NFL team
32. . 12-4. 1st AFC North. Cincinnati Bengals. A-. player
As they had been in recent years, the Cincinnati Bengals were expected to be competing at the top of the AFC North and be heavily in the mix for the NFL Playoffs in the 2015 regular season. However, the people predicting that Andy Dalton would look like an MVP candidate for much of the season (before his injury, obviously) and that the Bengals would start the season 8-0, finish 12-4, and handily win the division were few and far between.
The Bengals took tremendous strides forward this season for a number of reason. One of the underrated aspects of this year’s Cincinnati team is just how impressive their defense was on the year. They led the league in terms of scoring defense, but their ability to come up with big stops and make plays isn’t seen in a stat like that. Even when the offense struggled at times after A.J. McCarron came in for the injured, Dalton, the defense carried them.
Who knows what this team is going to do in the postseason, especially considering the uncertainty around Dalton and the rust he’ll have to shake off if/when he does take the field. However, there’s no getting around the fact that Cincy performed phenomenally over the regular season and deserves all the credit in the world for taking a step forward.
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