The future of the Bengals salary cap

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(02-28-2024, 03:49 PM)WeezyBengal Wrote: Let's take a look out and see where the Bengals stand after NEXT season (the 2025 season heading INTO the 2026 season).

As of RIGHT NOW, the Bengals will have THREE guys signed that are NOT on their rookie contract.

1. Joe Burrow (48M cap hit)
2. Orlando Brown Jr. (20M cap hit)
3. Logan Wilson (9M cap hit)

After that, the player signed making the most money is Myles Murphy at 4M dollars. The projected cap for 2026 is 447M and the Bengals are on the hook for 93M in active contracts leaving them with around 350M in cap space.

YES, I know the Bengals are going to sign players between now and then. Jamar Chase and CTB mainly. That being said, those contracts will most likely not be more than 40M combined which will still leave more than 300M in cap space.

So, my point is this...the roster drop off after next year is about to be HUGE. This team is going to look completely different, and it can choose to go in WHATEVER direction it wants. They want to sign Chris Jones this off-season and back load the contract? Go for it. They want to sign Tee? Go for it.

They aren't bogged down by any bad, long-term contracts. They aren't kicking the can down the road with void years on players contracts like other teams.

They are in an amazing place with the cap and roster construction. They HAVE the money, cap room, and flexibility to sign who they want. It's up to them to go in the right direction with their signings.

I'm 99.99% sure that's not accurate. That'd be ~$95m cap increases in both '25 and '26.

EDIT: Yup, looking at it that's with the Bengals having over $155m in rollover cap space heading into '26, because we haven't spent any cap space yet this offseason and without us spending any of our cap space in 2025 either. Lol.... the projected salary cap for the NFL in 2026 is $292.4m right now, and we seem to normally roll over $5-10m.