Bruised Bengals to battle baffled Bears

CINCINNATI — The host Cincinnati Bengals will try to recover from a humiliating home loss while the injury-riddled Chicago Bears look to put a road defeat behind them when the two teams meet Sunday.

The Bengals (3-5) thought they had some momentum building after beating the AFC North-leading Steelers on Oct. 16. They had fourth-quarter leads of 31-16 and 38-24 at home, and were outscored 23-7 in the final 15 minutes by a Jets team that entered as the NFL’s only winless team.

Adding to the misery, the Bengals had their starting quarterback injured on the next-to-last series of the game when Joe Flacco was sacked and sustained a bruised AC joint in his right (throwing) shoulder.

Bengals coach Zac Taylor said Wednesday that it’s 50-50 on whether or not Flacco will be able to play this week.

Should Flacco not be able to play, the Bengals will go back to Jake Browning, who lost all three of his starts after Joe Burrow injured his left big toe and had surgery.

“He wants to play in the game, so kudos to him,” Zac Taylor said of Flacco, who missed practice Wednesday. “He’s been here three weeks; he wants to play. I hate speaking for him, but that’s what he’s told me. He’ll have to work through the week to see if he’s able to do that. It’s a throwing shoulder. It’s painful.

“I’ve been happy with Jake’s response. He’s still working hard. If he’s in there and he gets the opportunity, then I have confidence in Jake and that Jake can win us the game. However it shakes out, we’ll have a great plan in place to help those guys.”

Leading pass rusher Trey Hendrickson re-injured his right hip late in the first half and did not return. He also missed the first practice of the week as preparations began for the Bears.

The Bears (4-3) could not get their offense on track on the road in Baltimore and fell 30-16 to the Ravens, snapping a four-game winning streak and falling further behind Green Bay and Detroit in the NFC North.

The Bears enter the game leading the NFL in turnover margin (plus-10) and interceptions (11). The Bears lost both categories in Baltimore, as Caleb Williams was intercepted once and the Bears lost the turnover battle, 1-0. They also committed 11 penalties to Baltimore’s six.

“We have to eliminate the penalties,” Chicago first-year coach Ben Johnson said. “We’re shooting ourselves in the foot way too much and we’ve got to be more efficient in the red zone as well on offense. I thought defensively we came out and we played well for the first, call it three and a half quarters. And then we gave up two touchdowns to finish the game and allowed 30 points when all was said and done.

“It’s really not that far off from how we’ve played the previous four games, and yet we won because we had those takeaways. (Last) week, we didn’t get the takeaways. When you play ugly football like that, it’s a lot more difficult to win the ball games. We’re on a mission here this week to get this all cleaned up, and I have complete confidence that we’ll do that.”

The Bears are also dealing with many injuries. They will be without defensive linemen Dominique Robinson (high ankle sprain) and Shemar Turner, who was put on season-ending IR with an ACL injury. Wide receiver Luther Burden III is in concussion protocol while three other receivers, Rome Odunze (heel), DJ Moore (hip/groin) and Olamide Zaccheaus (knee), also missed practice to start the week. Starting running back D’Andre Swift (groin) also sat on Wednesday.