The Cincinnati Bengals are once again off to a slow start to a season. One of the favorites to make it to the Super Bowl, the Bengals have one of the lowest-scoring offenses in the league so far and are averaging almost 10 fewer points per game than they did last year. Joe Burrow, Ja'Marr Chase, Zac Taylor and the offense have some soul-searching to do.

Heading into a bye week in Week 7, the Bengals have scored just three points in a game twice. They didn’t score below 13 points in any game last season and bottomed out at 15 points in a single game in the season before that. While Burrow's calf injury hobbled him a bit and Tee Higgins is dealing with a rib injury, those are not legitimate excuses for Cincinnati to be out-scored by teams like the winless Carolina Panthers and Zach Wilson-led New York Jets through six games.

The Bengals know full well that they need to string together more scoring drives, according to Ben Baby of ESPN.

“Not where we want to be,” Burrow said about the Bengals' offense, via ESPN. “We've had moments. But we just gotta put it all together.” Even after a win over the Seattle Seahawks that got them back to a .500 record, Burrow isn’t letting his unit off the hook.

Offensive coordinator Brian Callahan said just about the same exact thing that his superstar quarterback did: that the level the Bengals are at is not acceptable. Cincinnati already plays in a division with no bottom-feeder teams. There isn’t any room for error when every other team currently has a winning record and has either a defense led by an elite pass rusher or an offense that can go blow for blow with just about anyone.

“That's clear as day,” Taylor said. “We haven't scored enough to really take the pressure off our team. We know we're capable enough to do that.”

When the Bengals get back to action in Week 8, it will be against the San Francisco 49ers. They will absolutely need to find a way to improve before facing one of the NFL's best and most complete squads.