The Cincinnati Bengals figure to beef up the offensive line at least once in either free agency of the NFL draft.
While Jonah Williams is still on his way back and Fred Johnson is an encouraging prospect, the franchise can’t afford to sit on its hands if Joe Burrow is coming to town.
Disclaimer — teams rarely let great tackles hit free agency. We’ve already looked at guards. Here’s a taste of tackles who might hit the market the Bengals should target.
Bryan Bulaga
Are the Packers silly enough to let Bryan Bulaga hit the open market?
If they are, the Bengals should be all over it. Bulaga is one of the game’s better right tackles and is just hitting the age of 30. While he has missed some games over the prior two seasons, he put in 16 games of work plus the playoffs this season.
Paying up for Bulaga means Bobby Hart either shifts inside on the right side or goes to the bench. But even if it’s a short-term fix, it’s hard to complain about putting the best possible line out there in front of a rookie passer.
Anthony Castonzo
Is Anthony Castonzo going to keep playing? The veteran is weighing his future and it sounds as if it’ll be Colts or bust for 2020.
And yet, it wouldn’t be much of a list here without one of the best left tackles in football.
The idea of adding another left tackle might make some uncomfortable because it means moving Jonah Williams around already. But moving Williams and having him excel somewhere else means the Bengals have fixed two problem areas. It also is a whole lot better to move the first-round product and have him become a long-term starter than to have him go the way of Billy Price.
Anyway, Castonzo has been playing at a high level for a long time and it’d be a robbery if someone grabbed him from the Colts.
Jack Conklin
The Titans decided to decline Jack Conklin’s fifth-year option and it could mean a stellar 25-year-old right tackle is about to hit the market.
Conklin had some injury issues in 2018 but has otherwise played in all 16 games in three of four seasons. And that doesn’t change the fact he’s a guy who earned an All-Pro nod as a rookie.
Bookending Conklin and Jonah Williams is a little bit of a pipe dream, but the wild seems to happen often in the NFL’s version of free agency.
Andrew Whitworth
At the end of the day, a reunion with Andrew Whitworth doesn’t seem likely in large part because of how things ended. It’s no secret Whitworth has been forthcoming in revealing he wanted to finish his career in Cincinnati but felt the Bengals low-balled him.
And yet, Whitworth’s dip in play alongside his age (38) could mean he’s back on the open market anyway. It justs screams “good fit” for him to come back to Cincinnati and play a mentor role to Jonah Williams while either working on the left edge or even kicking inside and fans would love it.
