CINCINNATI — The Bengals are not the Chiefs, Ravens or Bills.
Their front office doesn’t and has never looked at the NFL trade deadline as an opportunity to add talent and get better.
They value their draft picks too much and have always felt players available are overvalued.
The Chiefs, Ravens and Bills know this as well, it’s just that their urgency to win is much more evident. That’s not opinion. That’s a fact. It’s why the Chiefs have added receiver DeAndre Hopkins and edge Josh Uche, the Ravens added receiver Diontae Johnson and the Bills plucked receiver Amari Cooper.
The Chiefs, Ravens and Bills believe in multi-layered approach to roster building that doesn’t end with training camp. If a player is available that fits their needs, they go out and get him. Like in baseball, basketball and hockey, this obviously sends a message to the locker room that the front office is always working and sometimes willing to take a risk to improve the chances of a championship run.
The Bengals don’t have that in their DNA, and if Joe Burrow didn’t know that before he certainly knows it by now. The Bengals have acquired exactly two players in the last 52 years at the deadline. One was a backup offensive guard – B.J. Finney – along with a seventh-round pick in the 2020 trade of Carlos Dunlap to Seattle.
The other was Hall of Fame receiver Charlie Joiner from Houston in 1972. Instead, the Bengals’ biggest moves at the deadline have centered on trading away problem children who upset the apple cart with the two biggest examples being Carson Palmer in 2011 and Carlos Dunlap in 2020.
With Tuesday’s 4 p.m. ET trade deadline looming and their AFC rivals making moves, what goes through Burrow’s mind when you see those teams getting better?
“That’s not my job,” Burrow answered me.
Does he ever wish the team would give you more weapons or build up other areas of the team with obvious needs like a pass rush?
“That’s not my job,” he repeated with a wry grin.
Burrow knows. And quarterbacking the team IS his job. That doesn’t mean he wouldn’t like to be in the shoes of Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson or Josh Allen, where management is doing their job to improve the odds that the Bengals could make the playoffs and then make a run.
Of course, one could look at Cincinnati’s situation and come to the conclusion that the Bengals have far more pressing issues than just one or two needs that could ever be addressed in a trae. And if you look at it that way, then that’s on the front office to do a better job from March through June in putting together a better roster around Burrow.
The Bengals are stubborn in their belief that their roster is their roster and no amount of handwringing from fans or superstar quarterbacks is going to change that. Any effort to change the minds of Mike Brown, Katie Blackburn or Troy Blackburn is futile.
Sure, the Bengals could lose this weekend to the woebegone Raiders and maybe, just maybe, they consider placing star receiver Tee Higgins or edge Trey Hendrickson on the trading block and get back something for an asset on a team that won’t be going to the playoffs.
But if the Bengals win, don’t expect them to add a defensive edge like Maxx Crosby or a corner like Denzel Ward because that would mean parting with a high-round first or second-round draft pick. Never mind the fact that the Bengals would be getting back a proven commodity in a star NFL playmaker instead of drafting a maybe.
This is and has always been the Bengals mindset: The player under long-term control is of much more value to a team than parting with team-building blocks through the draft. The inherent problem with that draft-heavy approach is – of course – if you miss time and time again in the draft.
Before the 2024 class, which offers some real promise in the likes of Amarius Mims, Kris Jenkins Jr., Jermaine Burton, McKinnley Jackson, Josh Newton and Daijahn Anthony and Matt Lee, the Bengals have not had particularly good drafts from 2019 through 2023.
They’ve hit with the likes of Logan Wilson, Germaine Pratt, Joe Burrow, Tee Higgins, Ja’Marr Chase, Evan McPherson, Dax Hill, Cam Taylor-Britt and DJ Turner since 2019. But they missed too many times to be in a position to turn down star players with proven track records.
All of this consternation and frustration over the roster could have been mitigated if the Bengals had beaten the Chiefs and Ravens in Weeks 2 and 5. But they didn’t and they sit at 3-5, just about ready to be pushed over the brink for the season.
“You can say this shouldn’t be where we are, but this is where we’re at,” Burrow lamented. “I don’t think you can look at it like that. You’ve got to adapt to the situation that presents itself. And this is the situation we find ourselves in. We know what we have to do going forward, and we’re gonna attack that challenge to the best of our ability and try to give ourselves the best chance to win my play and try to continue to be as consistent as I can and try to find a win.”
