(03-08-2025, 12:50 PM)Luvnit2 Wrote: The Bengals are cheap gets real old. The Bengals spend every year most of their cap money and then roll over the excess. Look around and you see teams like Pats with over 100 million left in cap space. Are they cheap too?

If Bengals offered Tee 30 to 32 million with only 50% guaranteed it is a fair offer. Tee has a history of injury problems yearly so makes sense the guaranteed portion will be a lit less than Chase for example. That does not make them cheap, it makes the good business people.

Browns guaranteed Watson contract coming off not playing and major sexual assault allegations. They were not cheap, but sure were stupid.

(03-08-2025, 12:50 PM)Luvnit2 Wrote: The Bengals are cheap gets real old. The Bengals spend every year most of their cap money and then roll over the excess. Look around and you see teams like Pats with over 100 million left in cap space. Are they cheap too?

If Bengals offered Tee 30 to 32 million with only 50% guaranteed it is a fair offer. Tee has a history of injury problems yearly so makes sense the guaranteed portion will be a lit less than Chase for example. That does not make them cheap, it makes the good business people.

Browns guaranteed Watson contract coming off not playing and major sexual assault allegations. They were not cheap, but sure were stupid.

(03-08-2025, 01:20 PM)J24 Wrote: Yes, the Pats are cheap too.  Their fan Base is pissed about it.  They also have a small scouting department as well.

Paying to the cap is overrated it's about fitting the  most good players in the cap. Which the FO doesn't do! I heard this on Twitter " The  Bengals view the cap as a pie when they should be viewing it as a puzzle".

(03-08-2025, 01:24 PM)Luvnit2 Wrote: You do realize teams can't go over the cap.

Again, not cheap, but as you said selection decisions via draft and free agency.

Bengals in the past have also been loyal to a fault. This is the first year I remember they cut 2 players with big salaries and my guess forced a 3rd into retirement.
That is also a huge part of poor decision making in the past, maybe they learned and will be better in the future.

I do ike the puzzle comment and agree.

(03-08-2025, 01:24 PM)Luvnit2 Wrote: You do realize teams can't go over the cap.

Again, not cheap, but as you said selection decisions via draft and free agency.

Bengals in the past have also been loyal to a fault. This is the first year I remember they cut 2 players with big salaries and my guess forced a 3rd into retirement.
That is also a huge part of poor decision making in the past, maybe they learned and will be better in the future.

I do ike the puzzle comment and agree.

(03-08-2025, 02:02 PM)Synric Wrote: Mike's back.

(03-08-2025, 02:02 PM)Synric Wrote: Mike's back.

(03-08-2025, 02:08 PM)Luvnit2 Wrote: Great news

https://www.bengals.com/news/reports-bengals-retain-te-mike-gesicki

(03-08-2025, 02:04 PM)J24 Wrote: Your right but they can restructure and back load contracts as well to give more room to sign players. Signing players early would be a good thing as well instead of waiting for the contact to end.

(03-08-2025, 01:12 PM)Clark W Griswold Wrote: If they trade Trey then they have to sign at least one starting level DE in FA.
I am still liking Chase Young as he had a lot of pressures last season. I saw him projected to get 2 years/$20 million. If that’s the case then I would definitely do it and for even more than that.  He is still only 25 and obviously has some talent. He was also a Buckeye so you know the Brown family wil like that.
He wouldn’t replace Trey but you would at least have an end who is younger and much cheaper.  Use the $ to re-sign the WRs and a FA G.

Would help open up the draft, too.

(03-08-2025, 12:59 PM)jason Wrote: Cool... Being good business people is awesome. Unless you're supposed to be good football executives, and owners... Then being good business people is just a small part of the equation.

(03-08-2025, 01:03 PM)NUGDUKWE Wrote: Well James Rapien is saying those rumors aren't true. Which i know it's speculation either way. But if we look at the facts we know that the Bengals have shown a tendency to low ball, not like players at 30 and Trey already signing multiple contracts with us so probably not having to worry about other hang ups like guarantees. Then it points to us being decently below those numbers as I believe he would've most likely signed.

I just think this is the beginning of the colossal failure we all should've feared this offseason turning into. I'm holding onto slim hope for free agency but I fear it's gonna be another one were we are silent until late next week signing 3rd tier players that aren't upgrades on paper hoping to hit.

(03-08-2025, 03:05 PM)rfaulk34 Wrote: Take a second and look at it this way.

The Bengals could have signed players to lower numbers in previous years, than what they're lowballing them for this year. (Ex. Chase to 32M APY last year, compared to 40M this year...or the 37M they're reportedly offering).

Bates, (Burrow doesn't apply to lowball), Higgins, Trey, Chase. 

If anyone...ANYONE...in that front office had any kind of ability to look ahead and know the cap was going up, to project what market price would be, they could have signed all these players in the last 2/3 years and it would not be hurting their cap at all and some of those contracts would be below current market price. 

Instead, they deal with what is going on right now and how it affects this years cap, and how they can keep from maxing that, so they don't have to 'pay for it in the future'. 

You can look at bottom line numbers all you want and talk about how it's "fair" but it's not really fair because the structure rarely if ever is competitive to what other teams do. 

This FO is very reactionary and it ALWAYS ends up biting them in the ass. A tiny bit of foresight would have this team sitting pretty.

The funniest part is, it's no different right now. If they went ahead and paid Tee, Ja'Marr and Trey what they're looking for, in 2 years, those numbers are going to look good for what the current market would be at that time.

Reactionary, mom and pop, cheap, stingy. All those things apply to this front office. 

Foresight is nowhere to be found. 

(03-08-2025, 03:08 PM)Essex Johnson Wrote: I would disagree they tend to  sign 30 and over, also we have been active day 1 day 2, even if they did not work out with rankin and bell on day 2 last year and the big in in 2023 in Brown.. and sifned more FAs last 3 yrs than i can remember 

(03-08-2025, 02:38 PM)bfine32 Wrote: When we signed Trey, he was a 25-year-old from the New Orleans Saints with four years of experience and 20 career sacks.

If we sign Chase he will be a 25-year-old from the New Orleans Saints with four years of experience and 22 career sacks.

Personally, I think the biggest difference is Trey has more heart and Chase has more talent. 

(03-08-2025, 08:55 AM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: 3yr/$90-100m extension > 2yr/~$50m of getting tagged twice

Plus the extension would come with a ~$20-30m signing bonus that he'd get right now and could invest and make money off of. Plus, again, potential possible future franchise tags are not guaranteed money until they're applied there is zero protection for him from a drop in production or a serious injury that would make the Bengals potentially not want to tag him again. There's a reason almost no player likes the tag and becomes disgruntled when they get it and almost all non-Bengals teams make sure that tagging a player is just a move to give them time to negotiate an extension that offseason rather than actually expecting them to play under the tag.

He does have a choice and it's not just retirement. He can just hold in and collect paychecks. He has a history of neck stingers, so he can just say that he tweaked it and doesn't feel right enough to practice soft tissue injuries are near impossible to disprove. Nobody around the NFL would blame him or find him less desirable because of it, because sacks are valuable and everyone is making fun of the Bengals for being a clown show organization right now and would understand.