Bengals give Trey Hendrickson an answer to his ultimatum and it's not the one Joe Burrow or fans want to hear
Trey Hendrickson told the world last month he wants a new deal from the Cincinnati Bengals, or to be traded off the team. The team is giving him the chance to fulfill the latter. Per multiple reports, the Bengals have given Hendrickson permission to seek a trade after both sides met Thursday. It's become fairly […]
Trey Hendrickson told the world last month he wants a new deal from the Cincinnati Bengals, or to be traded off the team. The team is giving him the chance to fulfill the latter.
Per multiple reports, the Bengals have given Hendrickson permission to seek a trade after both sides met Thursday.
It's become fairly common for Bengals players to request trades off the team. Germaine Pratt did so last month. Tee Higgins did it twice last year, Jonah Williams did it back in 2023.
It's extremely rare for the Bengals to grant the request. That's what they've done with Hendrickson.
This was not the desired outcome for Cincinnati. The club entered the offseason with the desire to reward Hendrickson for nearly winning Defensive Player of the Year. His 17.5 sacks from last season led the NFL and helped him become the team's first All-Pro on defense since Geno Atkins a decade ago.
To go down this route now makes a few things abundantly clear.
Bengals are far apart in negotiations with Hendrickson
Giving into a player's trade demand would only be wise if you believe that a deal is impossible to accomplish. Hendrickson reportedly wants between $32-33 million per year in his new deal, and this number may've changed after Las Vegas Raiders defensive end Maxx Crosby secured $35.5 million per year in new money Wednesday.
Whatever plans the Bengals had to pay Hendrickson appear, at minimum, on hold for now. Either they don't want to reach his asking price, or his asking price went beyond their expectations.
Hendrickson appeared to be on the outside looking in based on how director of player personnel Duke Tobin spoke of him at the NFL Scouting Combine. When asked about potentially dealing him away, he didn't shut it down like he's done before about Higgins.
“Our preference with Trey is to have him on our football team because we want him,” Tobin said in Indianapolis. “So I never really talked about open preferences for trading guys, because all that does is take on a life of its own. And that’s not something I want to do, because I want Trey on our football team. He’s under contract. We’re looking to pay him for what we believe will be really good future years and we see him as not falling off in his career. That’s why we’re actively trying, and if we get to the point where we’re actively trying to trade him, maybe I’ll give you a call.”
The Athletic's Dianna Russini also reported last week that Hendrickson is considered behind Higgins and Ja'Marr Chase in the prioritization of things.
If the Bengals can’t get deals done with all three, Hendrickson is most likely to be the odd man out. – The Athletic's Diana Russini
This doesn't have to be the case as there is plenty of money to go around for all three of them, but it looks to be that way in Cincinnati.
A trade is definitely possible, but not guaranteed
What the Bengals have essentially done is allow Hendrickson to gauge his market and report to the club what he finds. If there's a team willing to pay him the deal he wants and is willing to give Cincinnati proper compensation, then the Bengals will actually take it seriously and entertain the transaction.
The Los Angeles Rams just did this with quarterback Matthew Stafford, who surveyed his options such as the Raiders and New York Giants. The end result was Stafford coming back to the Rams and working out a restructured contract that made both sides happy.
That's still a possibility for Hendrickson and the Bengals. If he finds that his preferred destinations aren't willing to give him an offer he's looking for, or that team isn't willing to fork over the right compensation in the form of player(s) or NFL Draft picks, then a deal isn't going to happen.
All that said, this is still rare territory for the Bengals and even getting to this point is meaningful. They're serious about giving Hendrickson what he wants, even if that means giving him up to another team. If a reasonable offer hits their line, I have to think they take it at this point.
The larger implications, both good and bad
Let's start with what can possibly be skewed as positives here. The Bengals could simply let Hendrickson be miserable and force him to play out the last year of his deal. They'd open the door for resentment to bleed throughout the locker room and risk what happened last year in that regard to devolve into something worse. Linebacker Logan Wilson's reaction to the news speaks volumes on that front.
Allowing Hendrickson to seek a trade at least makes trading him away the worst case scenario here.
Doing this at all also points to the fact that signing Higgins and Chase is a true goal the team believes it can achieve. In all honesty, not checking that box after denying Hendrickson his raise is completely mandatory now, but hey, everything's relative with this franchise.
The negatives are much easier to put together. Failing to pay Hendrickson is indeed a failure. Not only did the front office plan for it, the most important person in the building wanted it to happen.
Joe Burrow made sure to include Hendrickson when pounding the table for his teammates to get paid by the club. He made it clear that letting good players continue to walk out the door is not good for the team.
"We need Trey back," Burrow said of Hendrickson last month. "We need to give him what he's worth and what he deserves. He's earned that."
You have to wonder what he thinks of what's happening now.
If the Bengals can't work things out with a player Burrow publicly deemed necessary to retain, where's the foundation for them to do anything of meaning to appease him? It's why Higgins and Chase's deals have to get done now. Failing to hit on their top two priorities after essentially giving up on No. 3 is not an option.
Bengals fans have become an extension of Burrow, echoing his desires from a broader perspective. This kind of news does nothing but damage the relationship between the the franchise and the community it relies on.
The Bengals won't have trouble finding teams interested in giving Hendrickson what he's earned. A trade should happen, or both sides should be able to come back and work something out.
Whatever happens, any grace the Bengals previously had is gone. Only success is tolerated now.