A thigh injury limited Bengals receiver Tyler Boyd to 15 snaps in the AFC Championship loss to the Chiefs. He believes that, if he had played the full game, the Bengals would have won the game.
“Still to this day, I feel like if I would have played the whole game, I was the key factor,” Boyd said Tuesday, via Ben Baby of ESPN.com. “We would’ve won the game.”
Boyd hoped to return, but nothing that he tried to resolve the situation worked. Eventually, he decided that returning to the game would disrupt the rhythm with quarterback Joe Burrow.
“I just felt like we had enough depth for guys like [Trenton Irwin] and other guys to come in and play at a faster pace than what I felt like I could do,” Boyd said. “I wish I was able to do it, but things happen.”
Boyd, who turns 29 later this year, enters the final year of his contract, at a salary of $8.45 million. With Tee Higgins due to be paid and Ja’Marr Chase up next, this could be Boyd’s last year in Cincinnati -- and his last chance to finish the job of getting to the Super Bowl and winning it with Burrow as his quarterback.