The Cincinnati Bengals' Super Bowl hopes were dashed during Week 11 of the 2023 NFL season, when Joe Burrow suffered a torn wrist ligament in his throwing hand that forced him to miss the remainder of the season.
Considering that hand/wrist injuries can be tricky to recover from, it was unclear when exactly Burrow would be back to full health. But Burrow put an end to any speculation when he provided his recovery timeline to ESPN's Ben Baby on Sunday.
"I think middle of May is when I am expecting to kind of be cleared for full contact and everything," Burrow told ESPN. "Over the next month [to] month and a half, we'll kind of decide all those things."
While it's absurd that Burrow is still recovering from an injury he suffered nearly five months ago, it's a great sign to hear that the Bengals' franchise quarterback will be back to full health by the time mandatory organized team activities (OTAs ) begin in June.
Burrow — who noted that he normally doesn't start throwing the football before OTAs anyway — also said after a Guinness fundraiser event on Sunday that he's getting back to some other ordinary activities.
"I can lift basically normally now, which I'm excited about," Burrow said. "So the next two months, I'll basically be just doing what I've done for the last couple of years. Just the 12 weeks of extra work in the rearview."
Injuries clearly derailed the Bengals' hopes of returning to the Super Bowl this past season, after they lost Super Bowl LVI to the Los Angeles Rams in 2022. But Burrow believes that, even without the injuries, his team wasn't good enough to compete for a championship.
"We need the guys that we draft to come in and be productive and take on the leadership roles that we've lost the last couple of years," Burrow said. "And we need to bring in the right pieces this offseason, too, whether it's the draft or free agency.
"Like I said, the injuries were what they were last year, but we weren't good enough in a lot of different places to make a Super Bowl run, in my opinion," he said.
Burrow has a point, given that the Bengals were just 5-4 when he went down this past year.
Perhaps a healthy Burrow and a solid 2024 NFL Draft will be what the Bengals need to return to Super Bowl form.
