Joe Flacco has only been a Cincinnati Bengal for 24 hours. It's all the time Zac Taylor needed to name the 40-year-old veteran the starter for Week 6.
Flacco will lead the Bengals into Green Bay this Sunday against the Packers, the Bengals head coach confidently announced Wednesday.
"Brings great experience, great leadership. His style fits our style of play, too," Taylor said. "Excited to get him out there. We'll start him this week, so he's going to take all the reps, get ready to go. Already spent a lot of time meeting with us, getting up to speed so we feel really good about where he's at."
Flacco's arrival seemed to invigorate Taylor, who displayed a new sense of conviction and excitement when speaking about the 18-year NFL veteran on Wednesday. The reasoning, Taylor said, is simple: Flacco has nearly 20 years of NFL experience, still has a capable arm and already faced the Packers just a few weeks ago.
A mid-week trade doesn't leave a team much time to get a new quarterback up to speed on the intricacies of an offensive scheme, but Taylor believes Flacco's wealth of experience -- plus a Tuesday evening, over-the-phone cramming session completed while Flacco was being driven from Cleveland to Cincinnati -- should prepare him well enough for Sunday.
"It's different than a young quarterback coming in, trying to learn a system and understand what a defense is trying to do to challenge you. Not only that, but he's played Green Bay this year so he's already gone through a week of prep," Taylor explained. "Now, the communication and weekly rhythm is maybe different, unique, but he's already prepared for this opponent. So he gets a chance to refresh himself on that while at the same time learning our system and our terminology and our verbiage and how we operate. Now, he hasn't played there this year so the crowd noise and all of that is different, but at least he's got some experience playing against them."
Cincinnati's Tuesday deal to acquire Flacco reeked of desperation, but after losing three straight to fall to 2-3 and getting outscored 113-37 in those losses, Taylor's team could no longer stand by idly and hope things would magically improve. Instead of running it back with a struggling, turnover-prone Jake Browning, Taylor was happy to hear the Bengals' front office was swinging a deal for Flacco.
What has been a dark, distressing stretch of football could turn a corner toward the light of hope once again if Flacco can prove Taylor right.
"You just know him," Taylor said. "I don't know him personally, only met him once before he came here, but know his game. Played against him, I don't know how many times. A lot of times. Very comfortable with his style. Concepts he's been good at, things that fit us that we do. A lot of the terminology, there's a bunch of carryover, more so than I would have anticipated. So, feel like we can get up to speed quickly."
If Flacco can accomplish a feat similar to the one he pulled off in Cleveland in 2023 -- win 80 percent of his regular-season starts while leading his team to a playoff berth shortly after arriving -- it will add another magical chapter to the storybook that has been Flacco's lengthy NFL career. But there are reasons for concern.
Flacco was only available because Cleveland had benched him in favor of getting a look at their rookie quarterbacks. The Browns' offense, while still a below-average unit, showed some improvement with Dillon Gabriel playing in place of Flacco (as well as the return of starting right tackle Jack Conklin) in a close loss to the Minnesota Vikings in London last Sunday.
The change in Cleveland was necessary after it became obvious Flacco's lack of mobility would not be sustainable behind the Browns' leaky offensive line. Flacco also developed a tendency to make some mystifying decisions with the football, producing some of the worst interceptions seen in the NFL this season.
The same circumstances exist in Cincinnati, where the Bengals have not been able to capitalize on their wealth of receiving talent because Browning hasn't had much time to throw. Like Flacco, Browning has also turned the ball over too often. Even more concerning is the Bengals' nonexistent running game, currently ranked last in the NFL at a putrid 57 yards per game -- nearly 40 less per contest than what Cleveland has averaged through five weeks.
Logically, Flacco might experience the same struggles that got him benched in Cleveland. But Taylor believes Flacco's skillset alone represents an upgrade over Browning, justifying the move and quick insertion into the starting lineup.
"The No. 1 trait you're looking for is a guy that can operate your system and throw the football," Taylor explained. "Joe's always been a tremendous passer in this league and I've seen it. So now we've got tremendous weapons that he can play around and I'm excited to see him do it."
The weapons in Cincinnati -- Ja'Marr Chase, Tee Higgins, Andrei Iosivas and even previously unheralded highlight producer Mitchell Tinsley -- are undoubtedly superior to what Cleveland boasts at receiver. Flacco will need time to throw to them, though, and won't find the going easy against a Packers defense headlined by quarterback hunters in Micah Parsons, Rashan Gary, Lukas Van Ness and linebacker Edgerrin Cooper.
Patience is a limited resource in the NFL. Cincinnati exhausted its supply with Browning; now, it's up to Flacco to deliver a new source of fuel to the sputtering Bengals.
