Tee Higgins officially puts the ball in the Bengals' court after making career-defining decision
The upcoming offseason is not going to be an easy one for the Cincinnati Bengals. An entire defensive reset is desperately needed from the pass rush to the safeties. Not one but two new starting guards will be a priority. Coaching changes will be aplenty. On top of all that, there's still the same predicament they've […]
The upcoming offseason is not going to be an easy one for the Cincinnati Bengals. An entire defensive reset is desperately needed from the pass rush to the safeties. Not one but two new starting guards will be a priority. Coaching changes will be aplenty.
On top of all that, there's still the same predicament they've been struggling to solve for two years. How do they keep Ja'Marr Chase and Tee Higgins with Joe Burrow?
Arguably the biggest roadblock preventing that has now officially been cleared away by Mr. Higgins.
A report from ESPN's Dan Graziano stated that Higgins may be looking for a new agent. Higgins had been represented by Athletes First's David Mulugheta for the last few years, but Mulugheta was no longer listed with Higgins according to Graziano.
The Enquirer's Kelsey Conway confirmed this suspicion Wednesday night, reporting that Higgins and Mulugheta officially parted ways.
The Bengals already have Burrow locked in for the next several years. They got very close to ensuring the same for Chase and will take a huge swing at it in 2025. Higgins has been a different story entirely.
While Burrow was closing in on his deal before the 2023 season, his fellow 2020 NFL draftee was not close at all in getting the bag he had wanted. The two sides grew no close after the season, leading to Higgins getting the franchise tag on the very day that window opened.
A couple trade requests happened, Higgins signed the tag and came back to work for training camp. You all know the timeline by now.
Mulugheta and his agency pride themselves on getting the most guaranteed money for their clients, an area the Bengals are still woefully behind the rest of the NFL. Higgins could've stayed the course with the representation that would likely net him the largest free agent deal possible in March if the Bengals were to let him go and not place a second franchise tag on him.
By letting Mulugheta go, Higgins made something loud and clear.
Tee Higgins proves he wants to stay with the Bengals
This is very simple to read into. Higgins has been vying for an extension to stay in Cincinnati since he became eligible in 2023. When he first realized that wasn't a possibility under Mulugheta, he tried forcing the Bengals' hand in requesting a trade. By the time he realized that wasn't in the cards, he turned his focus towards making the most of another contract year this season.
Somewhere along that road, Higgins reaffirmed that his top priority is staying in Cincinnati. As Graziano originally reported, a player changing agencies typically means their negotiating stance has changed. Jessie Bates III hired Mulugheta prior to becoming eligible for an extension a few years back, a sign that he was going for the most money possible. That was the beginning of the now unproductive relationship between Mulugheta and the Bengals.
Higgins doing the exact opposite of Bates by removing Mulugheta from the equation now injects life into a situation that appeared very bleak.
If both sides weren't seeing eye-to-eye before, nothing about it was going to change in a few months. Higgins would've either gone through the franchise tag cycle again, or found himself on a different team.
A new contract with the Bengals was not going to happen. It might happen now once a different agent comes into the picture.
Higgins did the Bengals a solid by casting Mulugheta to the side, but it's more of a bailout than anything. Mulugheta has been able to work with other clubs that have been willing to put guaranteed salaries into their contracts. If you're the only business where that practice is forbidden, that's absolutely a *you* problem.
Instead of finding a compromise, the Bengals held their ground and Higgins took matters into his own hands. He gave them the ultimate sign of good faith. He may as well rent a plane pulling a banner that says "LET'S WORK THIS OUT."
All the signs say that Higgins wants to be here. He wants to catch passes from Burrow and have Chase by his side making his life easier. The three are straight up close friends who have zero intentions of leaving each other.
Bengals now have zero excuses to not keep this trio together
Those are the faces of the franchise. Not only does it pay to keep them together, there's nowhere else the money should be going to at this point. The young players they tried developing on defense haven't panned out, and the promising ancillary pieces on offense are years from seeing second contracts.
Cincinnati will have to be busy in free agency, but as far as keeping money in house, it's Chase, Higgins, and nobody else aside from potentially a 30-year old Trey Hendrickson.
Seriously. That it's.
Everything has shifted now. Burrow's surprising confidence on the matter no longer looks surprising. Tagging and trading Higgins no longer has the same appeal since it was viewed as the better alternative than simply letting him walk. If an extension is not only possible, but likely, then that's the route that needs to be taken. You'd be pissing off the quarterback if not.
"I'd be very disappointed in that," Burrow said Wednesday when asked how he'd feel if the team couldn't retain Higgins. "Tee is a need."
Chase will be given a blank check. He's earned that leverage and the front office will have no choice but to sign it. It all comes down to finding common ground with Higgins. That ground didn't exist before. It can exist now.
Your move, Bengals.
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