Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow appeared to use one of his favorite "tricks" on Monday night in Cincy's 19-16 win against the Los Angeles Rams. 

With the Bengals trailing 9-6 midway through the third quarter, Burrow led the team on a scoring drive the ended with a Joe Mixon rushing touchdown. 

At one point during the drive, the Bengals faced a critical third-and-10 after Burrow took a hit from Rams defensive lineman Aaron Donald. 

As Burrow huddled his team to call the next play, he put his hands on his helmet and then motioned to the sideline as if he couldn't hear the play call. 

It then appeared that Burrow just called his own play. 

Burrow proceeded to throw a quick slant to Ja'Marr Chase to pick up the first down (impressive catch by Chase, by the way). 

You can see the moment at the 8:29 mark in the third quarter. 

While I'm not positive if that's what went down with Burrow on that specific play, history suggests it's highly likely. 

After the game, Burrow was asked if his headset went out during that play. 

"There were a couple of times throughout the game that there were some headset issues — I don't think that was one of them," said a coy Burrow. 

(Good try, Joe 😉.)

Cincinnati's coaches (specifically offensive coordinator Brian Callahan) have joked in the past that Burrow will pretend that he can't hear the play call if he has a play he really wants to run. 

From SI.com: “And after that we started joking with him. It’s like, Oh, yeah, the headset went out again,” (Brian) Callahan continued. “It’s like the headset can’t always go out, dude. But I think he kinda liked that. He liked having that kind of control and command. … On that one, I just said, Good job to him. But that’s who he is. He never panics.”

Burrow actually had to call four plays in a row in the 2021 playoffs against the Tennessee Titans because of headset issues. 

From SI.com: “Zac was in the middle of calling the third-down play, and it went out halfway through it,” Burrow said. “I knew the rest of the play, based off the beginning of the formation, so I called that. But then, if I remember right, we were out of timeouts, so we couldn’t call one to get it switched out. So I knew I was on my own. I wound up calling four plays in a row.”

Burrow’s actually wrong about one thing there—the Bengals did have a timeout left. They didn’t use it. And in that spot? A lot of coaches would’ve called it. Cincinnati didn’t.

“Certainly they would,” Callahan said. “And some quarterbacks would panic.”

Burrow didn’t.

If that's what Burrow did on Monday night against the Rams, then it was a smooth move by the former LSU quarterback. The Bengals badly needed to score on that drive. And despite not being 100 percent, Burrow was at his best on a drive where Cincinnati needed to come away with seven points. 

That's part of the reason why Burrow is one of the best players in the NFL, despite dealing with a calf injury that seems to be worse than anyone realized. He's at his best when the Bengals need him the most. 

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Featured image via Sam Greene/The Enquirer / USA TODAY NETWORK