AFC Notes: Bengals, Browns, Ravens

Bengals

Bengals QB Joe Burrow had high praise of WR Tee Higgins and thinks the receiver is “more explosive” in camp. 

“He came back strong. He looks great physically. He put a lot of work in the offseason between the time we ended the season to the time we came back to change his body,” Callahan said, via Geoff Hobson of the team’s official site. “He’s more explosive. I went back and watched some stuff the other day and looked at his routes on air right now and he’s markedly more explosive. It’s not necessarily that he’s gotten faster or that he’s a different type of player, he’s just now understanding how to bring those skills into practice every single day and the consistency that it requires to improve the speed you have to play with all the time.”

Burrow added that they are throwing more “deep balls” to Higgins in practice and feel he’s showing more speed in his routes. 

“He looks like a different guy out there,” Burrow said. “We were throwing the deep balls and the first couple I underthrew him a little bit and I was like, ‘Gee Tee, where did that come from?’ I didn’t really expect that from him. He’s getting out of there this year. We have some horses on offense that I’m really excited about. Tee’s going to have a big year.”

Browns

Browns’ OC Alex Van Pelt has seen some good things from QB Baker Mayfield and considers the fact that there will likely be more progress to come.

“He was impressive,” Van Pelt said, via Pro Football Talk. “There are a lot of areas and a lot of pass concepts that we wanted work on in this minicamp that maybe he did not completely own last year and wanted improvement in these plays. He has shown that. A lot of that is just working through progression and knowing where to go next if one and two are covered, and he got that accomplished in this camp. We are very happy with where he is right now. In the last seven or eight games last year, he really played really well. I think he now feels that. He understands what that looks like and how he has to operate within the system to be successful. Now that he realizes that, you see it more in practice.”

• ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler says people around the league think that Mayfield could be the first quarterback from the 2018 class to sign an extension, as his market is a couple ticks below what some of the other guys are looking at. 
• Cleveland.com’s Mary Kay Cabot indicated DT Sheldon Richardson turned down more money from the Browns to go and sign with the Vikings. 

Ravens

Ravens C Bradley Bozeman has been trying to improve his snapping with offensive line coach Joe D’Alessandris after the team was hurt by bad snaps last year.

“A ton – we just continued to practice. ‘Coach D,’ he’s kept us … Since I’ve been here, we’ve always stayed after and snapped. We’ve always stayed up on our snaps. We’ve always just made sure that everyone was ready for that opportunity when it became available. And no matter who it was, whoever went down, whatever person had to step in, those snaps were always ready. So, continued that tread over the offseason. Got back here and continued to do even more snaps and just trying to get that muscle memory and all that good stuff going. We’re just working away and trying to get it right,” Bozeman said, via Ravens Wire.