Borrowing the blueprint: Bengals’ adaptability could suit Patriots, Maye originally appeared on NBC Sports Boston

Each week this season, as the Patriots navigate their first year under Jerod Mayo and Eliot Wolf, we’ll look at their newest opponent and see if there’s an aspect of their football operations worth imitating as the new regime in New England works to turn their team into a contender.

This week we look at the Bengals, whose prolific passing attack featuring Joe Burrow, Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins is probably the envy of every team in the NFL except one. (The Chiefs haven’t done a bad job themselves.)

When it comes to what the Patriots should try to emulate, the obvious answer would be to surround Drake Maye with the types of high-end pass-catchers that Burrow has been able to work with over the past few seasons. Higgins was drafted in the second round the same year as Burrow (2020). Chase, who played with Burrow at LSU, was selected with the first round pick the following year.

It is therefore not surprising that their passing game took off.

The Patriots have already met one of those requirements by selecting a rookie wideout in the second round to go with their rookie quarterback.

Ja’Lynn Polk is a different type of receiver than Higgins. He’s not the prototypical “X” who’ll live on the sidelines and make a living off of jump balls. But Polk can make contested catches, and he has the route-running chops and toughness that Wolf and Mayo felt made him worthy of the No. 37 overall pick. He’ll be part of what’s expected to be a four-wideout rotation on Sunday in Cincinnati, along with DeMario Douglas, KJ Osborn and Tyquan Thornton.

So… take another wideout at the top of the draft in 2025 and mission accomplished, right?

That would be the easy answer. And it’s a path the Patriots may still prefer, depending on where they land in the draft and the talent they have at their disposal.

But the aspect of the Bengals’ offense that may be most adaptable for the decision-makers in Foxboro is Cincinnati’s offensive prowess under head coach Zac Taylor.

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Taylor arrived in Cincinnati after a two-year stint as an assistant to Sean McVay, who, like a branch of the Mike Shanahan tree, led an offense heavy on under-center passing concepts. Taylor also put his NFL experience to work in Miami during four years under head coach Joe Philbin, who worked for veteran West Coast disciple Mike McCarthy in Green Bay, where under-center play was highly prized. (Patriots offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt and offensive assistant Ben McAdoo are both former assistants to McCarthy.)

When Burrow was drafted No. 1 overall, instead of playing him under center often and employing a more traditional West Coast offensive scheme, Taylor did what was best for his quarterback and had him play in the shotgun. A lot.

In Burrow’s first two seasons, the Bengals ranked third (2020) and second (2021) in spread dropbacks from the shotgun, according to Sports Info Solutions. Coming off a spread system at LSU that led to a historic 2019 for Burrow and a Heisman Trophy, that kind of shift made sense for Taylor. Soon, with the addition of Chase, the offense blossomed. Burrow led the league in both completion percentage (69.9 percent) and yards per attempt (8.6) in 2021 while averaging 8.2 yards down the field.

In 2022, Taylor pivoted again. Even with his explosive arsenal, opposing defenses used two-high safety shells to protect against Burrow’s deep shots. The answer? Short throws.

The Bengals continued to lead the league in shotgun spread attempts (second to only Washington), but Burrow’s average depth of target dropped by more than half a yard (7.6) and his yards per attempt dropped by more than a yard (7.3). Still, he remained one of the most efficient passers in football, ranking second in yards (5,195) and completion percentage (68.0).

In 2023, the Bengals again showed a willingness to pivot. While they were still siding with the shotgun before Burrow suffered his season-ending wrist injury, they appeared to be leaning toward mixing in more under-center looks to diversify their offense.

Burrow returned just three passes from under center in Week 8 against the 49ers, but the Bengals ran 11 times from under center and showed they could be effective against one of the best defenses in football by mixing their offense with Burrow crouching behind Ted Karras. They returned four passes on their first 10 plays that day — something even the team’s website noted as an outlier in retrospect — and one resulted in a 15-yard pass play to Chase. They rode their shaken-up offense to a dominant 31-17 road victory.

Burrow’s injury didn’t give the Bengals much of a show as an under-center offense, but they continued to work on under-center looks with Jake Browning at quarterback. They ranked in the middle of the pack (18th) in under-center attempts between Weeks 11 and 18, and during that span they ranked 10th in yards per pass attempt as an under-center (10.1 yards).

The Bengals made Burrow feel comfortable early in his career by giving him weapons and putting him in the shotgun. They asked him to shoot deep. And then short. Then they toyed with the possibility of putting him under center.

While Burrow may be a bit stubborn when it comes to his preference to play from the starting lineup, Taylor has shown he’s willing to both accommodate his best player and encourage a diversified offense while adjusting his scheme from year to year.

Taylor’s weapons have helped his offense find success. And his quarterback has operated with machine-like efficiency. But the head coach’s open-minded approach has helped Cincinnati rank among the elite of offensive football for several years now, and it’s a skill worth studying for the Patriots.