The Bengals’ high-flying offense could be taking a step back over the next few weeks and that’s because Ja’Marr Chase is expected to miss some time due to a hip injury.
Although it’s unclear how long Chase will be out, the All-Pro wide receiver is expected to miss Monday’s game against the Cleveland Browns, according to NFL.com. If Chase only misses one or two games, that would arguably be the best-case scenario for the Bengals, because there’s at least one report that he could be out for more than a month.
According to ESPN.com, the injury could sideline the Bengals star anywhere from four to six weeks, and if it’s the longer end of that window, Chase would be out until December. Chase was held out of practice on Thursday and at the time, Bengals coach Zac Taylor said it was because the hip was “sore,” but clearly, it’s more than that.
With Chase possibly staring at a six-week absence, the Bengals could place him on injured reserve. However, if they go that route, then Chase will have to sit out at least four games, so they’ll only put him on IR if they feel like there’s no way he can make it back inside of a month. The Bengals have a bye in Week 10, so if Chase sat out in Week 8 (Browns) and Week 9 (Panthers), that would give him four weeks to heal and he’d only miss two games in that span.
This is a devastating injury for a Bengals offense that was starting to find its footing over the past few weeks after a slow start to the season. The Bengals have won four of their past five games and a big reason for that is because of Chase, who has absolute gone off over his past two games with at least 130 receiving yards and two touchdowns in each game, which were both Bengals wins.
The 2021 Offensive Rookie of the Year originally injured the hip in Week 6 against the Saints. During that 30-26 win, Chase caught seven passes for 132 yards, including a 60-yard game-winning touchdown that came with under two minutes to play. In the days after that game, Chase showed up on the injury report for the first time all season and he even sat out of the team’s Wednesday practice in the lead up to their Week 7 game against the Falcons.
Against Atlanta, Chase caught eight passes for 130 yards and two touchdowns. However, he did most of his damage in the first half, which is notable, because he appeared to reinjure his hip with just 20 seconds to go until halftime.
Although Chase returned to the game in the second half, he wasn’t very active.
The absence of Chase means that Taylor is going to have to completely revamp the Bengals offense. The Bengals have the weapons to succeed without Chase, but there’s no guarantee that will happen. One thing the Bengals will need to lean on in Chase’s absence is Joe Mixon and the running game, but that could be trouble, because the ground game has been nonexistent this year (The Bengals are averaging just 87.4 yards per game on the ground, which is fifth-worst in the NFL).
If you’re looking at the Bengals passing game, Joe Burrow threw 27% of his passes (74 targets in 270 attempts) to Chase this year and those are going to have to go somewhere else. The good news for the Bengals is that Burrow does have good chemistry with the rest of his receivers. Although Chase leads the team with 605 receiving yards, both Tee Higgins and Tyler Boyd are right behind him with 455 yards each. Those will be the two guys who will have to pick up the slack because Burrow is definitely going to be looking their way with Chase out.
Also, Mixon (182) and Hayden Hurst (226) both have more than 180 receiving yards on the season.
It’s going to be an uphill battle for the Bengals offense, but they have several winnable games in the next few weeks (at Browns, Panthers, BYE, at Steelers, at Titans) and with the way their defense has been playing, the defending AFC champions might be able to weather the storm of Chase’s absence.
The Bengals were a shade over 50% to make the playoffs with Chase in the lineup but if he were to miss six weeks, their postseason possibilities decrease to under 44%, according to CBS Sports data scientist Stephen Oh.
