The Cincinnati Bengals, like most, didn’t offer up much other than vague talk at the scouting combine.
Except when it came to cornerback Darqueze Dennard.
Predictable or not, director of player personnel Duke Tobin was at least up front about the team’s plans, according to Paul Dehner Jr. of the Cincinnati Enquirer:
“With Darqueze, I predict that he’s a guy we would like to have back,” Tobin said. “I don’t know how much competition there will be. It’s hard to predict free agency, but he will be a guy that’s in our talking plans, and we’ll be visiting with him and see what we can get done.”
The Bengals would be smart to pursue a reunion with Dennard, who they made the 24th pick in the 2014 draft. He’s slowly morphed into one of the NFL’s better third corners, a position that is quickly catching up to the money boundary corners receive.
Assuredly, other teams on the open market would love to get a shot at Dennard, meaning the Bengals might want to take a business-as-usual approach here and stop him from even reaching market.
The Bengals have north of $50 million in cap space for now, so doling out a fair contract to keep him in town shouldn’t be too difficult.
