The Bengals Can’t Make the Justin Jefferson Mistake
Credit: Jake Crandall, Montgomery Advertiser via Imagn Content Services, LLC
The Cincinnati Bengals have one of the best wide receivers in the NFL, and at some point, they are going to sign Ja’Marr Chase to a long-term deal that is going to pay him enough money to set him and his family up for generational wealth. They need to strike now, or they’ll risk making the same mistake the Minnesota Vikings made with Justin Jefferson.
The Vikings and Jefferson were in a similar situation last offseason, and the two sides’ failure to agree to a long-term contract before the season cost would up costing Minnesota at least a couple of million dollars per year.
There was never a report about what the Vikings officially offered him during the contract negotiations after the 2022 season. Still, every catch he made during the 2023 season translated into a little more money than the Vikings had to hand out. Jefferson only played 10 games during the 2023 season but still caught 68 passes for 1,074 yards and five touchdowns.
By the time the offseason came around, Jefferson was the question of the offseason in Minnesota. There were even rumors about the Vikings possibly needing to trade Jefferson. Still, right before the Fourth of July, he signed the richest wide receiver contract in NFL history that will pay him at least $110 million guaranteed over four years.
So, what exactly does this mean for Chase and the Bengals? If the Bengals allow him to step onto the field in 2024 without a long-term deal in place, the price for an extension will only go up. NFL wide receivers’ contracts aren’t getting cheaper anytime soon. Last season, even with Joe Burrow out for part of the season, Chase caught 100 passes for 1,216 yards and seven touchdowns. During his NFL career, he has grabbed 268 passes for 3,717 yards, finding the end zone 29 times.
In April, Bengals executive vice president Katie Blackburn said the two sides had yet to begin contract extension talks. “We haven’t started,” Blackburn said of extension talks with Chase. “That’s sort of the next thing is just to piece together some of those things to consider and give it some thought. And like I said, I can’t say for sure where any of it will go. But we certainly are going to study up on it and see what we can figure out to try to get the best result we can for the club one way or another.”
At this point, there have been at least preliminary talks about the contract extension, and the Bengals must push to get the long-term deal done. The two sides will almost certainly come to an agreement at some point; the question is just how many years and how much guaranteed money he is going to get.
The problem for the Bengals is they don’t have the leverage in the contract talks, just like the Vikings didn’t during the 2023 season. Once the season started, the only way that Jefferson wasn’t getting a bigger deal was if he suffered a devastating injury, and the same is probably true with Chase.
Chase knows that the more success he has on the field, the more money he will make long-term, so unless Cincinnati will back up the Brinks truck this offseason, there is no reason to sign right now unless he’s concerned about an injury that could threaten his career. Chase has consistently made it clear that he wants a long-term deal with the Bengals.
“Lord knows, I want to do that,” he said earlier this year. “I mean, but we’ll see what happens.”
While others in similar situations have held out, Chase has made it clear that isn’t the case here, which gives even more indication that he’s comfortable with the contract negotiations right now. He probably feels that a long-term deal will be made at some point, even if that isn’t before the start of this season. If he was concerned about the team not offering him what he wants at some point, there would probably be more talk about a holdout.
At this point, signs do point towards a similar trajectory as Jefferson. He will play out this season, and then next offseason, he will get a long-term deal done that could end up making him the highest-paid wide receiver in the league. The Bengals are the ones who need to have urgency here and try to speed up the timeline, because if they don’t, it’s going to cost them millions.
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