Turnovers, Zac Taylor and the AFC Playoff Race for the Bengals

CANDID ZAC: Taylor was hardest on himself. There were two communication snafus in the first half that got Burrow visibly heated on one and Mixon giving an exasperated illegal procedure signal even though it was a delay of game on the other. Burrow had just thrown a 29-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Tee Higgins to cut the lead to 24-6 when Taylor opted to go for two.

But he had to call a timeout and when they tried to do it again, they still couldn’t get the play in and took a delay of game.

“Horrific (management) by me. Horrific, horrific, horrific,” Taylor said. “We were going for two, and so we were a little slow making sure we had the right personnel on the field. When I made that mistake, I was going to call timeout and put the ball on the hash (mark), wait and see what personnel they were in, so I ended up calling the play backwards and I tried to correct it at the last second and ended up taking a delay of game. So it was just horrific management of a situation by me twice coming out of a timeout. We ended up having to take a delay of game, and ended up missing the extra point on top of it.”

The one at the end of the half, the Bengals had a third-and five from their own 46 as the clock ran down from about 10 seconds and Burrow was trying to clock it. But time ran out and Burrow yanked off his chin strap on the way to the locker room. Mad, it seemed later, at himself.

“That one was partly on me. I was yelling ‘clock,’ it was third down,” Burrow said. “Just a miscommunication on all ends.”

Taylor again took the blame.

“There might have been too much on the clock, (so) if we don’t convert, they get the ball back,” Taylor said. “So that was a difficult one to communicate in the moment. The guys on the field were going to clock it — we were trying to get into a pass — and that confusion for three, four (or) five seconds costs you when there’s only 10 (left). It’s kind of a rare third-down situation we were in right there. The communication is critical (and) it’s got to be crisper from me to make sure that we’re all on the same page and make sure we’re all getting one call, and I’m trying to change it, essentially. That’s just bad ball (management) on me.”