The Cincinnati Bengals come into 2021 with a fully healthy Joe Burrow and excitement throughout. The team should see a great boost in offensive production, meaning a large boost in fantasy production as well. It will be fun to keep track of some of these young stars on Cincinnati, while also tackling the fantasy world’s age-old biggest question mark.
Make sure to check out all of our other 2021 Fantasy Football Previews.
Quarterbacks – Joe Burrow
The former No. 1 pick out of LSU, Burrow was doing extremely well, averaging 17.4 points per game before that gruesome ACL tear. Now, Burrow has got a much-improved line, and even more, weapons to utilize, including former LSU teammate, and Biletnikoff Award winner, Ja’Marr Chase. With all this at his disposal, we could be looking at a point increase that gets him into the 20s. Still, he’s not one of those top quarterbacks to draft early, rather, a later-round guy to fall back on.
Running Backs – Joe Mixon, Samaje Perine
Remember that big question mark we were talking about? Yeah, that’s Mixon. Every single year someone takes Mixon in the second round of their draft, and he is a letdown every time. It’s just impossible to judge when this guy will finally break out and hit the big numbers. He’s in the perfect scenario but has never really capitalized. The good news is Giovani Bernard is gone. Bernard was the lead passing-down back and pretty much took all receptions from Mixon. He is expected to be much more involved in the air attack now. However, Perine is a good receiving back as well, so we’ll have to see how that dynamic plays out.
Wide Receivers – Ja’Marr Chase, Tee Higgins, Tyler Boyd
With the selection of Chase, the Bengals solidified their wide receiving corps as one of the best in the league. Now, that isn’t too great for fantasy. All three players will steal touches from each other. However, they’re still worth drafting as each brings their own unique skill sets to the table. Overall, the talent from all three of these guys is too much to pass upon and they’ll all go relatively early.
Tight Ends – C.J. Uzomah, Drew Sample
Like his quarterback Burrow, Uzomah was doing great before his season-ending injury. He will now assume the No. 1 tight end role this year and try to keep up his production, even with all the great receivers around him. He averaged 11.4 points in the two games he played in last season and was looking incredibly promising before that injury. If Uzomah gets hurt again or isn’t fully healthy right off the bat, Sample isn’t a horrible option to look to. If you have a team struggling for tight ends, both Uzomah and Sample (if Uzomah is injured) are good pickups and capable of getting the job done.
Defense/Special Teams
The Bengals’ D/ST was absolutely morbid in 2020. They only averaged three points per game, while not getting into double digits at all. On top of that, they dipped into the negatives four times, truly a poor season all around. They should improve a bit in 2021 with pickups like Trey Hendrickson, and a bunch of great young rookies on the front seven, but only time will tell how good they actually get.
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