The Cincinnati Bengals open training camp in a week, and everything about this offseason has pointed toward one goal: winning a Super Bowl for the first time in franchise history.

Cincinnati’s aggressive offseason moves, from free agency signings, trading for Dexter Lawrence, to manipulating the salary cap with Joe Flacco and Joe Burrow’s contracts, were made with a Lombardi Trophy in mind. If they weren’t, the wrong people are in the building. This kind of swing may be standard across the league, but for anyone like myself in the Queen City, it was rare to see from the front office.

If it doesn’t take them far, we may never see the Bengals swing this hard again under coach Zac Taylor and quarterback Joe Burrow.

Burrow himself feels as good as he’s ever felt about his team. He casually predicted a Super Bowl win back in May and followed that up by declaring his feelings are reminiscent of the offseason before he led LSU to a title in 2019.

The pressure is real, and it’s worth laying out exactly what needs to go right for this team to fulfill its potential. These are the five things that need to happen for Cincinnati to finally win it all.

Joe Burrow remaining healthy

No individual in Paycor Stadium matters more than Burrow. He has missed 16 games over the last three seasons, and the Bengals have won just five of those 16 without him under center. There has been plenty of talk about quarterback Jake Browning and Joe Flacco having productive stretches in Burrow’s absence, but Cincinnati as a team is simply not successful enough when No. 9 is sidelined.

The Bengals got an MVP-caliber season out of Burrow the last time he stayed fully healthy in 2024, and despite a defense bad enough to get Lou Anarumo fired, they still managed to win nine games.

Every team needs its QB to stay healthy for a shot at the title. Burrow’s recent history has simply made it imperative to say it out loud. No. 9 staying on the field is priority No. 1.

A true third receiving option emerging

Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins are more than capable of carrying the passing attack by themselves. But the last time the Bengals made a deep postseason run, they had a genuinely reliable No. 3 option in Tyler Boyd.

Cincinnati hasn’t had the greatest success replacing Boyd’s role in the slot. Wide receiver Andrei Iosivas has had his moments, but still has much to prove in a contract year. Tight end Mike Gesicki has found a role within the offense, though getting him the ball isn’t always quick or easy.

If the Bengals can get true consistency out of their tertiary option, one who takes attention away from Chase and Higgins on a regular basis, the offense has a chance to take another step forward. Whether it’s Iosivas taking that leap in a contract year, or even TE Erick All Jr. stepping up in what could be his first full healthy season, it doesn’t matter who fills the role. There just needs to be more reliability out of the No. 3 role.

Amarius Mims and Dylan Fairchild building off 2025

The Bengals’ offensive line has a chance to prove itself as a truly competent unit. That is the expectation in Cincinnati, even if some outside the city still view this as a shoddy group.

Orlando Brown Jr., Ted Karras, and Dalton Risner are who they are at this point in their careers. Fairchild and Mims are the young players who can elevate themselves into high-quality starters. We saw flashes from both of them last season when the line solidified with its five starters. Mims is the former first-round pick, billed as a potential All-Pro. But don’t sleep on Fairchild, who was mighty fine in pass protection to end last season and played at that caliber at Georgia.

Should the veterans stay steady and the two under-25 starters progress into even better players, this offensive line has nowhere to go but up.

Boye Mafe or Myles Murphy becoming a true finisher

I have a lot of confidence in the Bengals’ starting edge-rushing duo in terms of generating disruption and pressure. With a better interior defensive line anchored by Lawrence between them, the defensive front should be solid as a whole.

But think about this for a second: who do you expect to lead Cincinnati in sacks? If the answer is Lawrence, the Bengals probably aren’t getting enough from their two featured players off the edge.

Mafe’s reputation centers on his ability to win quickly, but struggle to finish at the quarterback. He’s now getting paid $20 million a year to do exactly that. Murphy impressively tallied 5.5 sacks last season despite only starting the back half of the year. Can that translate into a full season’s worth of production?

One of these two needs to take a leap in converting pressure into sacks. It needs to happen this year.

Bryan Cook being everything Cincinnati paid for

The Bengals will lean on their new starting safety in more ways than one. Cook is a phenomenal tackler, a great communicator, and generally a reliable player at the position. But Cincinnati needs leaders in the back half of its defense, and the Bengals haven’t had that from the safety position since Jesse Bates III and Vonn Bell left three years ago.

Cook is the hometown guy who wants to bring a championship to Cincinnati after winning two of them with one of the Bengals’ biggest rivals in Kansas City. He was the first free agent the team signed this offseason, a clear target of the front office to address a position that has been a weakness for far too long.

If Cook can keep everybody in cohesion behind an improved pass rush, this defense will carry its weight alongside an offense that is already built to compete.

Despite missing the playoffs for three consecutive seasons, there are still plenty of people who refuse to count out the Bengals as long as Burrow and company are taking the field. Execution and health win football games. Cincinnati needs players on both sides of the ball to step up and become difference makers if this team is going to win a championship for the first time in its 59-year history.