Last year, in the days preceding the regular-season opener, the Bengals gave quarterback Joe Burrow a market-level contract. This year, will it happen for receiver Ja’Marr Chase?
Bengals owner Mike Brown has sent mixed signals regarding the desire to sign Chase before 2025. Chase has conducted a hold-in for most of camp; he has practiced only once.
At one point, coach Zac Taylor was asked whether Chase is being fined for not practicing. When Taylor declined to answer, we had the answer. Yes, yes he is.
The situation has yet to explode, due in large part to the fact that the media hasn’t really focused on the situation — not with the Cowboys consuming all of the oxygen and attention. Of course, neither the Bengals nor Chase’s camp have provided many quotes or sound bites that would create headlines.
The simple truth is that it has been ugly. And there’s a good chance that, if Chase doesn’t get his deal by Thursday of this week, it could get a lot uglier.
Why are the Bengals dragging their feet? We know that the price always goes up, never goes down, when a team delays signing a player to a new deal.
The key becomes delaying the new deal beyond the fourth year. Even if the eventual APY will be higher, they’ll get the player for one more season at a bargain-basement price. The Bengals will pay Chase only $4.8 million for 2024, without a new deal. (The Cowboys are getting a fourth year out of Micah Parsons — who absolutely should have held out — for $3 million.)
So, sure, the Bengals will pay Chase more next year than what they’d pay this year. But they’ll pay less than $5 million this year if they can kick the can into 2025.
That doesn’t make it right. Some have pointed out that, unlike the other receivers who were clamoring publicly for new deals, Chase has two years left on his rookie contract, not one. But so what?
The rookie wage scale, adopted in 2011, ensures that first-round picks who never play well won’t suck millions out of the system. Those who pan out, like Chase, were deprived the kind of payday they used to receive. So the team needs to pay those players as soon as they become eligible for second contracts.
