If Cincinnati Bengals WR Ja’Marr Chase expected a new contract this year, he was probably disappointed yesterday. Bengals owner Mike Brown essentially said that he doesn’t anticipate completing a contract extension before Chase’s fourth season. Even still, he remained confident they would sign the wide receiver, who still has two years left on his contract.
“It’s not so likely that this is the good time to negotiate”, Brown said yesterday when asked about Ja’Marr Chase’s contract, via Ben Baby of ESPN. “The offseason is a better time for that and we’re going to try to keep focused on the football part”.
The Bengals are, like the Pittsburgh Steelers, among the franchises that don’t negotiate deals during the season. But the Steelers do plenty of deals during training camp, which is only just beginning. There is still plenty of time to negotiate, and Brown did allow that “opportunities can arise unexpectedly”. But what opportunity would arise for Brown behind Chase accepting a below-market contract?
A top-five pick in the 2021 NFL Draft, Ja’Marr Chase is a three-time Pro Bowler in three seasons. He has 268 receptions for 3,717 yards and 29 touchdowns in 45 games played to date. On top of that, he also has 45 receptions for 588 yards and three touchdowns in seven postseason games.
While Brown acknowledged that Chase is the Bengals’ “key player” right after QB Joe Burrow, he still put a damper on anything pertaining to contracts. “I’m not going to rule anything out, but I will tell you that the die has probably been cast”.
To be clear, there is virtually no risk of Ja’Marr Chase ever leaving the Bengals. As a former first-round pick, the Bengals already exercised his fifth-year option through 2025. He is not in a contract year, and relatively few non-quarterback first-round picks sign massive new contracts entering their fourth season.
Chase’s college teammate, Justin Jefferson, reset the wide receiver market earlier this offseason, which surely made him very happy. He just signed for $35 million per season, now the highest-paid non-quarterback in NFL history.
The Bengals know that they will have to compete with that. They made Burrow the highest-paid player in NFL history at $55 million per year (tied with Trevor Lawrence). While I’m sure they want to come in under Jefferson’s figure, Chase may not sign for less.
Chase will earn $4,862,679 this season without a new contract, which is a pittance for a player of his quality. He will never see his fifth-year option, but as of now, he is due $21,816,000 in 2025. The Bengals will work out a new contract before then, and when they do, that price is only going up.
The Cleveland Browns signed Myles Garrett to a new contract going into his fourth season, despite the fifth-year option. Conversely, the Pittsburgh Steelers did not do the same for T.J. Watt, who only signed a new deal shortly before the start of his fifth season. There is no one-size-fits-all template for how these things go, but nobody is surprised that the Bengals and Mike Browns might not pay a player like Ja’Marr Chase before they absolutely need to. We’ve seen this show before.
