Baker Mayfield — Week 1: Three Fumbles, Twenty-Three of Twenty-Eight
2026 NFL Season · Half-PPR Scoring · Monday, Sep 14
Mayfield completed twenty-three of twenty-eight throws for two hundred sixteen yards with no touchdowns and no interceptions, was sacked four times, and lost three fumbles — one a strip-sack that Cincinnati returned twenty-seven yards for a touchdown, one a scramble that ended at the Cincinnati four and rolled through the end zone for a touchback, one a fourth-quarter sack that Cincinnati recovered at his own forty-four. He also ran for the nine-yard touchdown that made it a six-point game in a 33–27 loss to the Bengals.
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The play that turned Sunday's game in Cincinnati was worth −19.9 points of win probability, and Baker Mayfield never threw the ball. Third and nine at the Tampa Bay 33, six 29 left in the first quarter, Buccaneers up three to nothing, no huddle: Mayfield was sacked, the sack split by Myles Murphy and Barrett Carter, the ball came out, and Demetrius Knight picked it up at the 27 and ran it in. Win probability is the chance of winning the game given the situation, and that single play took a 51 percent favorite and made it a 31 percent one. By expected points added — what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — it was −6.6, and it was the first of three fumbles Mayfield lost.
The second came with 12 15 left in the half, first and five at the Cincinnati 12 after two Bengals penalties had moved the Buccaneers from the 29, Tampa Bay down 14 to three: Mayfield scrambled up the middle for eight yards to the four, Carter knocked the ball loose, and Bryan Cook recovered it in the end zone for a touchback. −6.1 expected points. The third was first and 15 at the Tampa Bay 46 with 10 41 left in the fourth, down 30 to 20, Boye Mafe's sack, Cincinnati ball at the Tampa Bay 44, and a field goal seven plays later.
The throwing line reads nothing like that. 23 completions on 28 throws, 216 yards, no touchdowns, no interceptions, four sacks. The five incompletions included a deep shot to Emeka Egbuka on the second play of the game and a first-and-nine throw to Tez Johnson from the Cincinnati nine with three 31 left. On the next snap, second and nine, Mayfield scrambled up the middle nine yards for a touchdown, 33 to 27. He carried five times for 30 yards in all, four of them scrambles, and the 32 pass plays came out at −7.9 expected points added, which is the fumbles and the sacks and not the completions.
Back in June the preview's read on Mayfield was that a QB12 season had come from a full 17 games of availability, and that the efficiency and the touchdown rate were the part not to count on. Sunday was one game, and the efficiency was fine at 82 percent completions while the touchdowns through the air were zero, so the June read half held and the ball security question was one the preview never asked. Tampa Bay is home to the Browns on Sunday the twentieth. The number to watch is fumbles, and the hope is that there is nothing to watch.
_Data via nflverse._
When Baker Mayfield's week moves the numbers, you'll know — every episode, in one weekly email.
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