Why the **** is Jessie Bates not signed yet?

[Whatever]

(04-18-2022, 06:18 PM)NUGDUKWE Wrote: I must have missed where Bates said he didn't want to be the highest paid safety. I had hoped that wasn't the case. I'm all for paying him as he is liked by a lot of the players and seems to be a team leader. He is also pretty steady with his play and in my eyes had earned another contract. I does feel like the Bengals are not as creative with they're contracts as other teams. I also think we could find ourselves in a bad spot with him if we let it ride until after the draft. If we don't draft a safety his price isn't going down but if we draft an heir apparent early than that could cause it's own drama. 

If I had my way I would say hopefully we can draft a guy like Nick Cross a safety that can get on the field this year but probably fills more of the Vonn Bell role going forward. Then if we get thru the rest of the draft filling most of our areas of concern we can use some of our remaining cap space on a Bates deal. At least as far as if we want the larger cap hit in year 1.

Bates never said he didn't want to be the highest paid S.  He said he wasn't overly concerned "with the ego part of becoming the highest paid S".