It literally rained on his parade when the air opened for his last two or so plays of the day. One snap slipped through his hands and the last he gave to Mixon.
That it’s raining in Joe World. But that confidence was not rusted when he was asked about his nerves for an NFL opener suddenly less than a month away.
“I’m more excited than nervous, I would say,” said Burrow, who could only laugh when asked if that surprised him. “Absolutely not. Have you ever heard anything else about me about nervousness?”
But Burrow found time Tuesday to flash what made him so good in a college red zone. He had the ability to turn water into wind when he saw everything on the rocks, knew when he would have to leave the bus and could throw a bullet while on the death row.
On Tuesday, Bengals radio analyst Dave Lapham asked Burrow to estimate how many times in the red zone last season he made something out of nothing. A quarter of them, maybe a little more, he said.
He did so Tuesday to wide receiver Tyler Boyd for one of her three touchdowns, and finding none open and then rolling to the right before Boyd saw his patented charge come in the middle of the end zone.
“In the red zone, a lot of touchdowns come outside the structure of the offense,” Burrow said. “You call a play to a certain coverage in the red zone and you do not get it and there is not much space to improvise outside, so you have to get out of the box, you have to expand plays, you have to allow boys “Finding the windows and getting them open. That’s something I’m always proud of and I know our coaches put a lot of emphasis on it.”
That Burrow and Taylor are a good match after a season that the Bengals saw so many drives die in the 20. They were the third worst in the league in red zone percentage red zone and 28 quarterbacks had more red zone touchdown- then pass Andy Dalton 10 at a 52 completion percentage.
“We were terrible in the red zone. We improved later in the season. But overall, we were terrible at the end of the year when you look at our red zone (figures),” Taylor said. “A lot of it was on third downs. Our percentage of third downs down there was not very good. That’s been a whole point of emphasis this whole offseason.”
Boyd has been on Burrow’s field in the first week for one simple reason. Look no further, but Burrow has not had his top four receivers at the same time. AJ Green was great until he tweaked a hamstring on Monday and did not practice on Tuesday. John Ross has been in California for a week for Covid in his family. Around the same time, rookie Tee Higgins pulled a hammy.
Higgins returned to the individual on Tuesday, but is only looking for Boyd to be in the scrimmage. Tough break after the lock-down spring and sporadic summer Burrow had nearly zero time compounded timing with receivers scattered throughout
