Taylor not ruling out Mixon for Sunday’s game vs. Packers

The Bengals (3-1) are hoping to have all hands on deck for Sunday’s home game against the NFC North-leading Packers (3-1).

“All of our guys are trending in the right direction for this week,” Taylor said. “I call him more day to day. For a running back like Joe with an ankle, early in the week, especially Wednesday, potentially going into Thursday to keep him off of it, don’t read anything into that if he’s limited early in the week when you guys are out at practice. I know he wants to play and will do everything he can to put himself in that position.”

Taylor said the ankle injury is not connected in any way to last year’s foot injury that sidelined Mixon for the final 10 games. Back then, Taylor did classify him as week-to-week, hoping he could return but eventually the team just shut him down late in the season when it became clear he might as well recover and not risk re-injury.

The Bengals would need to lean on Samaje Perine and Chris Evans more if Mixon can’t go Sunday. Evans has featured more in the passing game since the preseason and has played limited snaps so far, but Taylor said the team has confidence in his ball-carrying ability as well.

“We haven’t gotten a lot of plays in these games, necessarily, so if you were seeing, as like our defense is facing these 80 play games, you would see more of that and see more Samaje and see more of Chris, but our plays have just been limited,” Taylor said. “We’ve been pretty balanced running and throwing, and Joe is still only getting sometimes 16 to 20 carries, and so I’m not concerned about that load right now, but certainly we feel like we’ve got depth in the backfield to get those guys opportunities when the opportunity comes up.”

Last year when Mixon went down, quarterback Joe Burrow’s pass attempts went up so he was throwing more than 37 passes a game. The Bengals were trailing in most of those games, but Taylor said the team wants to be more balanced whether Mixon is on the field or not.

“I think Mixon is one of the top backs in the league, but again, we want to build a lot of things off the run,” Taylor said. “It keeps people at bay when you can run the ball as well as we have at times. It just sets everything up, takes the pressure off the quarterback, takes the pressure off the offensive lineman, too, to the point they don’t have to protect as much. So, we want to be a team that can play with the lead and be able to attack you in a lot of different ways on offense when you’ve got that lead and running the football is a part of that.”

Taylor likes things he has seen in all three phases of the game so far, but said the next step is just starting out faster and taking some pressure of the defense.

The Bengals have had to play from behind twice and got off to a slow start in their opening win, as well, scoring 14 points over the final two minutes of the first half to take a lead. Taylor said there isn’t a common denominator for those slow starts, a penalty, sack and field goal contributed in three of the games where that was the case.

“I think if we could have better ball control in the first half and limit the defense,” Taylor said. “It certainly helps for them to be fresher in the second half. They’ve had some games now where they’ve been stuck on the field, had some long drives they’ve had a hold off. So that would be the biggest thing is just, again putting more points on the board early and taking control of the lead and helping our defense.”

With the Packers bringing a high-powered offense led by quarterback Aaron Rodgers, the Bengals’ offense may need to put up points early to have a chance.

“They got Aaron Rodgers on their team, Lord knows I respect that man,” wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase said. “I’ve watched him come back in 36 seconds so just high praise of him and just sitting on the sidelines watching him play, we’re going to need to score. Put up more points than he does because of who he is.”

SUNDAY’S GAME

Packers at Bengals, 1 p.m., Fox, 700, 1530, 102.7, 104.7