2024 Franchise Tag

[*ochocincos*]

(09-06-2023, 01:18 PM)007BengalsFan Wrote: I would hate to see Tee walk and get nothing for him when we could trade him and get a draft pick that would help the team.

As far as tagging Tee, a WR tag next year is expected to cost 23 million.  If the Bengals were willing to spend 23 million to tag Tee, wouldnt they just sign him to a 23 million per year contract?  Tagging Tee and keeping him doesnt make sense when they could just pay him a 23 million per year contract to begin with.

It would come down to investing that amount of money for multiple years vs just a single year.
You also have to worry about what others will end up costing too, specifically Chase.
If Higgins gets $23 mill for multiple years, you have to think Chase will want $30+ mill APY, which is what Tyreek Hill has.
And the only WRs to get $23+ mill APY currently are Hill, Adams, Kupp, AJ Brown, Diggs, Metcalf, Deebo, McLaurin.

You have to think Higgins+Chase will be around $50 mill APY together, and Burrow will probably be $50+ mill himself.
So ~$100 mill in just 3 players.
The base salary cap for this year is $225 mill, and it will go up but by how much? It's typically been going up just $5-8 mill each year outside of COVID.
Let's just assume it'd be $250 mill by the time all 3 guys are on the books.
You're gonna invest ~40% of the entire cap to just 3 offensive players, none of which are OL?

If you do that, you better be ready to get real creative on OL and defense outside of a few guys.