The Cincinnati Bengals are officially under a week away from starting the regular season. They will hope to do so at full strength as well.

Cincinnati will for sure be without rookie backup guard Brian Parker II and back up nickelback Ja’Sir Taylor. Both players were placed on the Reserve/Injured list last week, and will miss the first four weeks of the season.

Every player on the 53-man roster, however, has a shot to play on Sunday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. There are still a few injuries to monitor in the coming days involving these names.

Shemar Stewart

The Bengals opened training camp the same day Shemar Stewart suffered a hyperextended knee. Cincy’s first round pick from the 2025 NFL Draft proceeded to miss the next month of practice, but did participate in a very limited fashion towards the end of last week.

Stewart has yet to participate in any team drills since going down in late July. It would seem very unlikely for him to play in a game without crossing that bridge first. The Bengals were still open to placing him on I.R. after establishing the initial 53-man roster, but now that he’s returned to practice, it looks like he’ll be able to play within the first four weeks of the season.

I would not expect Stewart to suit up on Sunday, but he is close to returning.

Ja’Marr Chase

Nearly three weeks after Stewart’s knee injury is when Ja’Marr Chase went down with a hyperextended knee of his own. Chase confirmed to reporters directly following his injury that he could play the next day if needed. Cincinnati was getting set for its third and final preseason game; a game in which Chase was not needed in the slightest.

Chase was held out of practice last week, but coach Zac Taylor stated he feels good about him playing. It’s possible chase is limited during the first two practices of the season before going full and doing enough to play in the opener.

Tee Higgins

It was learned last week that Tee Higgins has a heel contusion. The injury held him out of practice last week as well.

Taylor said he feels the same about Higgins as he does with Chase. He should be fine to practice this week.

Dax Hill

Dax Hill suffered a hamstring injury during the first week of training camp. He finally returned to practice the day of roster cuts, and spent all last week working through individual drills.

Nothing is for certain here, but Hill returning to practice when he did give him a strong chance of playing Week 1. That he missed around a month of practice time, however, opens the door for him to be on a snap count in his first game. Rookie Tacario Davis has been wrapping more often with the first team so he should be ready to play significant snaps if needed.

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