The Cincinnati Bengals front office outdid itself on this one.
Trae Waynes agreeing to teams with the Bengals seemed like a shocker in large part because of the sticker price — three years and $42 million with $20 million doled out Year 1.
That’s a stunning amount of money but context is important. Or we should say structure.
The only guaranteed money in Waynes’ deal is his $15 million signing bonus. He’s technically $20 million in yearly cash this year but really only a $10 million cap hit. He’ll get a $2 million bonus if he’s on the roster by the fifth day of the league year in 2021, effectively guaranteeing he sticks around after so much money invested. But there’s an out built in, as the Bengals can cut him before 2022 with only $5 million dead cap charge.
Call it a front-loaded deal. Also perhaps call it a way to get in the game when it comes to big-name free agents:
Besides landing a starting boundary corner, structuring the contract like this gets the worst-looking part of the deal out in front. When this is a team thinking about big-money extensions for A.J. Green and Joe Mixon, that’s important.
So too is it important to show a willingness to pay big for players who want to come to town. The Bengals just did this twice.
If nothing else, it’s proof the Bengals can pull off these sorts of moves when they want, with an emphasis on the want part of the equation.
