The Cincinnati Bengals are 4-9 and quarterback Joe Burrow is frustrated.
It’s an open question whether Burrow even wants to remain in Cincinnati going forward.
“If I want to keep doing this, I have to have fun doing it,” Burrow, who returned Nov. 27 after a nine-game absence due to a turf toe injury, told reporters in Cincinnati.
“You know, I’ve been through a lot and if it’s not fun, then what am I doing it for?
“I’ve been through more than most and it’s certainly not easy on the brain or the body so just trying to have fun doing it again.”
Told by a reporter that he “seemed frustrated,” Burrow added: “There’s just a lot of things going on right now, a lot of things going on right now.”
ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter said on “Get Up” he believes Burrow was speaking “through the media” and sending a bigger message.
“[Quarterbacks] don’t always speak to the media,” he said. “They speak through the media. And so that was a message, that I can tell you, caught the attention of other teams across the league. They’re like, ‘Woah, did you hear what Joe Burrow said?’
“So now every team that has a quarterback question is paying attention to what Joe Burrow said,” Schefter added. “Now I don’t know if he was talking to those teams or whether he was just thinking out loud, but I can tell you that it ignited a debate across the NFL about his state of happiness in Cincinnati.”
Burrow, 29, signed a five-year, $275 million contract extension in September 2023, making him the highest-paid player in the NFL at the time, with $219.01 million guaranteed and an average annual value of $55 million, keeping him under contract through the 2029 season.
Andrew Luck retired from the Indianapolis Colts in 2018 after playing 86 games and getting sacked 174 times. Burrow has played 13 fewer games than Luck (73) and been sacked 29 more times (203).
ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky mentioned several teams that might be interested in Burrow going forward, including the Jets, Las Vegas Raiders, Los Angeles Rams, New Orleans Saints and Minnesota Vikings.
“I don’t know if [Burrow] said, ‘I don’t want to be here [in Cincinnati]’ as much as, ‘I don’t know if I want to be here,’” Schefter said.
