Cincinnati Bengals DE Trey Hendrickson has huffed and has puffed, but he isn’t likely to blow any houses down. Last week, he took to the media to vent his frustrations with the organization, escalating things further. Having already requested a trade, he said that he would not play this season under his current contract.
That’s all well and good, but unless he’s willing to make good on his threats, nothing is going to change. Now, perhaps he could, and would, like Haason Reddick did last year, but he didn’t get what he wanted, either. After all, like the Jets, the Bengals have already granted Hendrickson permission to seek a trade. Reddick ended up only getting a reworked one-year contract after missing part of the 2024 season.
But do you think Mike Brown is the type of owner who cares—generally, yes, but also specifically about this? Do you think Mike Brown would care if Trey Hendrickson sat out for the Bengals—in the sense of doing anything about it? Of course he wouldn’t, and his whole biography as the team owner shows that.
It’s why veteran Bengals reporters Paul Dehner Jr. called the Hendrickson situation an avoidable, out-of-control drama. “Just another Tuesday in Cincinnati” is how he described the All-Pro’s impromptu on-field press conference last week. “This has too often become the reality show around these parts”.
Whether it was Jessie Bates III’s contract or Jonah Williams’ trade request, Mike Brown has allowed his team to flirt with trouble almost any time money is involved. They didn’t even get Joe Burrow signed in time for training camp a couple years ago. Joe Burrow. Which is why it felt like a minor miracle that they signed Tee Higgins to a long-term extension. An extension Hendrickson believes he deserves from the Bengals.
He told reporters that he signed a one-year extension in 2023 believing that they would do right by him the following year. Well, Hendrickson matched his 17.5 sacks from the previous season, and the Bengals are sitting on their hands. Perhaps serving as Mike Brown’s mouthpiece, you also have their executive director of player personnel basically telling him “take it or leave it” and his head coach warning him about fines for theoretically skipping minicamp weeks from now.
And there’s not even anything for Hendrickson to take because the Bengals’ front office stopped communicating with him about a new deal. Dehner argues that these sorts of avoidable dramas spill over onto the field. He believes they have contributed to the Bengals coming up short, including missing the playoffs last year. Ja’Marr Chase held in throughout camp seeking a new contract, and they struggled early in the season, looking out of sync on offense. They stormed back late in the season, but the hole they dug proved too deep.
How the Bengals’ current drama with Trey Hendrickson will end, I don’t know. What are they willing to take for him via trade? Meanwhile, their first-round pick, Shemar Stewart, isn’t going to practice until he has a signed contract, either.
