Zac Taylor was asked what he remembers about the huge October of 2021 win at Baltimore, a game that feels very similar to the one upcoming this Sunday. Taylor tossed out the line, “seven-man protections.” That was the day that the Bengals trotted out a new wrinkle that had both Perine and Sample in the backfield — hence the seven man protection — as a way to scheme up the unique blitzes that the Wink Martindale defense threw at them. The Bengals went on to change a lot about how their protections operated after that game. Heading into 2022, a new Baltimore coaching staff coordinated by Mike Macdonald studied the Bengals’ pass protection scheme and threw some new stuff at the Bengals. No DC has done as good of a job as Macdonald did between 2022-23 at scheming up ways to keep the Bengals’ passing game in check. On and on the chess match went. Staffs and schemes have changed, but that 2021 game was a turning point for the chess match between the Bengals’ offense and this Baltimore defensive coaching staff tree.