The Cincinnati Bengals are relying largely on young players in 2025, and largely they've been disappointed by many of those young players who needed to take big steps this season.

There are a few bright spots, so we'll break down all of the Cincinnati Bengals, young players in a midseason progress report starting now.

You are locked on Bengals, your daily Cincinnati Bengals podcast, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day.

Well, up Bengals fans, and welcome to another episode of the Lockdown Bengals podcast, part of the Locked On

Podcast Network, your team every day.

I'm Jake Liskow, joined today by Mike Santagena, our resident film expert here on

Lockdown Bengals to break down how the young players are doing in 2025.

And despite a lot of doom and gloom around this team,

there are a few bright spots and we'll get to in today's episode,

leading with Dylan Fairchild's effort against the Chicago Bears,

hopefully a breakout game for him and the steady progress of DJ Turner

before we get to the rest of the young guys

on this team really being asked to play big roles this season.

Welcome back to the everydayers out there.

Welcome back to everyone who makes Lockdown Bengals part of their daily routine and their first

listen.

We appreciate all of you out there who make us part of your daily life.

And Mike, today, as we dive into a mid-season status update for the Bengals young players,

well, there's a lot of negative that we're going to have to get to today.

A lot of players on young contracts that are not contributing,

or on rookie contracts that are not contributing at a high enough level.

But we're going to start with some positives.

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