Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow is assisted to the locker room with an injury in the second quarter at Paycor Stadium.

In the early goings of a hopefully promising season, the worst possible thing has happened to the Cincinnati Bengals. Franchise quarterback Joe Burrow is injured. And he's not going to return to the field for a good while.

Yes, Jake Browning has proven to be a capable backup in the past, especially with the weapons Cincinnati is working with. But there's something simply different and much more dynamic about the Bengals when Burrow is firing lasers all over the field. He's a top-five quarterback when healthy, which makes news of his toe turf surgery that much more devastating for Bengals fans.

As it stands, full recovery from such surgery usually takes around three months. That means the earliest Burrow might play for the Bengals again will be around mid-December. The Bengals play the Baltimore Ravens at home on December 14th and the Miami Dolphins on the road on December 21st. That's assuming all goes well in his recovery and rehabilitation. Oof. Well, at least it's not definitively season-ending, right?

This isn't much better news given the timeline, but it's not a complete disaster.

For Bengals fans' sake, I sure hope they're still in playoff contention whenever the face of their franchise returns.

This article originally appeared on For The Win: When will Joe Burrow return from injury for Bengals?

Reporting by Robert Zeglinski, For The Win / For The Win

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