Tee is now the only tagged player without a new deal

[CJD]

(05-17-2024, 03:14 PM)Nate (formerly eliminate08) Wrote: I don't think losing Tee will be as big of a deal as you are making it out to be now that we added Burton and the TE's.

Tee is banged up a lot.

We don't need to pay 2 WR's big money, just one IMO. Keep making the trenches strong and we should be more than fine with Joe, 
Ja'Marr and everybody else on Offense. I am still for bringing Ted Karras back after this year who is a good Center and we all know 
that is hard to find. There may be others that play very good this year that we might need to pay to keep in the SB picture for years.

To be clear, (almost) any player can be replaced. The Bengals have shown the ability to replace players fairly well, especially at WR, where we have had at least 1 tier 1 receiver every season for the last 25 years.

I'm looking at it from an asset management stand point.

You have Jessie Bates. A tier 1 safety who wants to stay in Cincinnati, and you fail to sign him because of the 2nd year guarantee when everyone in the universe knows that you will not cut them after 1 year, even if it's the worst season in the NFL. Just give him the money.

You have Tee Higgins. A tier 1 (or tier 2, whatever) wide receiver who has shown he can be a #1 receiver (some of his best games are when Chase was injured), and who can make circus catches regularly. You have him on a cheap deal in the 2023 off season where everyone was talking about trading for him.

You don't trade him because "he's too valuable."

Now, it's one year later, and you don't even want to offer him 20M AAV?

If he is so valuable, lock him up or trade him for the first round pick you plan to use to replace him.

We let Bates go and got basically nothing for him. 

If we continue down this embarrassing path, we're going to lose Higgins in 2025 and get nothing for him either.

Either lock up your assets or trade them when their value is at its highest.

The Bengals are sitting on the fence between these two options in the absolute worst way possible.

And they're embarrassing themselves in the process, with two players requesting trades and leaks coming that they are cheaping out on Higgins without any response from the front office.

This is a Super Bowl caliber QB and a super bowl caliber roster at the moment.

I want a Super Bowl caliber front office. One that knows how to manage its assets.