Andrew Whitworth shares what he would’ve done with Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins contracts

The Cincinnati Bengals have basically chosen to do nothing with their two star receivers, failing to negotiate deals with either.

That has left them in limbo for a long time, and while it looks like the Bengals will sign Chase in the offseason, Tee will likely either be tagged again or just leave in free agency and neither option seems very compelling.

The reason it has gotten to this point is because of the Bengals’ lack of decisiveness when Higgins’ contract was first running out. The Bengals don’t have to just take my word for it; they could also take it from the mouth of Andrew Whitworth, who would’ve handled the negotiation very differently.

Whitworth, who, of course, was not offered a contract extension, and the Bengals clearly wished they had him retire as a Bengal with how the replacements turned out.

In a recent interview with Paul Dehner Jr. of The Athletic, Whitworth commented on the Bengals’ situation with Chase and Higgins.

“I’m one of these guys that, you know, some Bengals fans will probably hate my take on this, but I thought that they should have traded Tee or Ja’Marr years ago. Like, I really thought after, you know, really that second stint where they go back, they almost make it back to the Super Bowl, lose to the Chiefs, I thought they needed to make a decision.”

Whitworth seems to be referring to the time after the Bengals lost to the Chiefs in the AFC Championship game. Tee was entering the final year of his rookie deal and likely had the highest trade value he ever would in his career. Obviously, with hindsight of them not making the playoffs in 2023 and likely 2024, it’s even easier to argue for the trade.

Whitworth’s main argument is that when you hit, if you aren’t planning to extend players, you have to take the best value you can and reload through the NFL Draft. The Chiefs did that when they traded Tyreek Hill away when his contract demands got out of hand. They used the saved money to extend key players and the picks from the trade to acquire cornerstone pieces of their Super Bowl teams.

Now, the Bengals will be left with another tough position with Tee for the third year in a row. Will they tag him and force him to play, tag him and try to trade him for whatever they can get at this point, or just let him walk in free agency?

In the end, they have put themselves in this position by not being more decisive earlier, as Whitworth said they should have been.