CINCINNATI -- The moment he found out he might be catching a touchdown pass in the Cincinnati Bengals' Week 3 matchup against the Tennessee Titans, quarterback Andy Dalton started giving his teammates a hard time.

"Who's going to catch a touchdown first," he joked all week with the players who normally catch passes from him. "Me, or these other guys?"

Him.

In fact, the only touchdown pass in the Bengals' 33-7 win over the Titans came when Dalton sprinted to his left after first pitching to receiver Mohamed Sanu. Sanu then threw the ball back across the field, where it landed in Dalton's hands as a defensive back stumbled awkwardly past. Dalton ran hard toward the pylon, diving ahead of a desperate tackle attempt to complete the 18-yard score.

Trick plays like that one have become the norm in the Bengals' offense since Hue Jackson took over as offensive coordinator in January -- so much so that coach Marvin Lewis contends there are no such things as gadget plays in his system.

But how have they become such a big part of the Bengals' scheme?

"It's a calculated risk," Jackson said about the diversity of trick plays and formations. "The more versatile we are as an offense, the harder we are to defend. When people know 'this is where the ball goes,' people can defend that. But we have several guys that when they touch the ball, a lot of good things can happen."

On normal game weeks, trick-play nominees are suggested in coaches' meetings on Mondays and Tuesdays. After a Sunday game, Monday is the day when coaches and players review film and start reassessing what did and didn't work. They also start thinking about what they might be able to pull off when they face their next opponent.

"Hue does a great job of having an open dialogue and ideas get bounced around," receivers coach James Urban said of the meetings. "I don't think anybody would claim [the play ideas] as their own. They're all our ideas and Hue does a great job of having that forum where we can say, 'Hey, how about this?' Or he can say, 'What do you think about that?' And then, we put the plan together."

By the start of practice Wednesday, the Bengals typically have a clearer idea of what they want to execute in order to keep an opposing defense honest.

That's also about the time defenses start planning for the possibility of a Bengals play that might force defenders to maintain gap responsibilities and assignments. It's during those workouts that teams are training their defensive players to keep their eyes focused on the ball because the Bengals could do virtually anything with it.

Take the Titans, for instance. Tennessee coach Ken Whisenhunt had a hunch in the middle of the week before the game that the Bengals might pass to their quarterback. After all, the week before, Cincinnati did open its second drive against Atlanta by pitching to Sanu on an end around before he stopped and threw a perfectly placed deep ball to fellow receiver Brandon Tate, who caught the ball 50 yards downfield before falling out of bounds.

On the touchdown pass to Dalton, the Titans guessed right. Even as Sanu tried hard to sell the pitch as if he was going to run the ball, cornerback Blidi Wreh-Wilson wasn't far away from Dalton when the quarterback leaked out to the left. Dalton said Wreh-Wilson was closer to him than Bengals defenders were when Cincinnati practiced the play earlier in the week. All Wreh-Wilson had to do was either jump the route and intercept the ball, or deliver a hard hit to Dalton as soon as he caught it.

He did neither.

"Part of being a pro, whether it's you getting the rep or not, when it shows up exactly the way you ran it [in practice], you have to make the play," Whisenhunt said after the game.

A byproduct of the Bengals running these types of unique plays in practice is that their defense gets better prepared for times it may see tweaked formations or plays.

"It's like playing option football," Bengals coach Marvin Lewis said. "You have sound defensive principles all the time. When you look at an offensive play, everybody has certain responsibilities as you defend it by each front and cover. You just have to be sound. You have to be disciplined with your eyes and do your job."

After running a few reps of the gadget play during the midweek practices, the Bengals circle back on Fridays just to make sure they are good with what they want to employ. After that, the play doesn't get discussed much until Sunday, when it gets executed.

In each of the Bengals' first three games, there has been an interesting offensive wrinkle. Whether it was the unbalanced front in Week 1 that put tackles Andrew Whitworth and Andre Smith in the slot as extra receivers, or the receiver-to-receiver pass against the Falcons a week later, the Bengals have been letting opponents know their playbook is expansive this season, new coordinator or not.

"I tend to kind of be who I am and this is who I am if you check my track record," said Jackson, who has been a coordinator in Washington, Atlanta and Oakland. "I don't hold much. I've never been a guy like that. I believe in our players, how we coach them, what we ask them to do, how we ask them to execute it. If you do that, you stand a good chance of good things happening more often than bad things happening."

There haven't been very many bad things happening to this point for the 3-0 Bengals. Dalton still hasn't been sacked and they've had only one turnover; they had seven at the same point last season. It's because of that mostly clean play that Jackson is convinced his team can handle running his creative plays.

"As long as we get to the next down with the ball, we'll be OK. That's what I really stress to the guys," Jackson said. "It's OK to run all this stuff. It's super. But if we turn the ball over, it's a bad thing."