Well, nobody can ever accuse the Cincinnati Bengals of not spending money again.
The Bengals went huge in free agency over the last two days, agreeing to terms with not only D.J. Reader, but Trae Waynes and potential starting guard Xavier Su’a-Filo.
So where are the Bengals? Here’s some context from Geoff Hobson of Bengals.com:
“The Bengals have yet to announce a deal pending physicals, but their three free-agent agreements are believed to count for about $23 million under this year’s salary cap, on top of A.J. Green’s $18 million tender and $8.6 million in restricted free agent tenders.”
The roughly $18 million on the Green tag plus the $8.6 million on restricted tenders cozy up to about $23 million in cap hit for Reader, Waynes and Su’a-Filo. Reader and Waynes are estimated at about $10 million each against the cap. The Bengals also ate roughly $3.6 million in dead cap charges from cutting John Miller and B.W. Webb, but saved $5.2 million on those moves in the process.
That leaves the Bengals with an estimated $10 million or so in free space as of this writing. But that’s before any potential restructures or further maneuvers. Andy Dalton’s $17.7 million cap charge is going to come off the books too.
Written another way, it reeks of superb cap work while managing a lot of moving parts and spending big.
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