After a disappointing 2024-25 season, the Cincinnati Bengals are having an equally frustrating offseason. Despite signing Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins to extensions, ensuring Joe Burrow has two elite targets until at least 2029, the team is still facing several issues.
Trey Henderickson is refusing to play under his current contract, Germaine Pratt has been released, and complications are surrounding the contract status of their first-round draft pick. With all these problems, do the Bengals have any chance at competing next season?
Here’s a look at the six most consequential player situations entering the 2025-26 season, and how each will be pivotal to the Bengals’ having any success.
Having shown great improvement last season, Chase Brown is set to enter next season as the Bengals’ lead running back. His quick first step, extreme explosiveness, and ability to fight for extra yards netted him 990 rushing yards in the 2024-25 season.
Along with increasing his success rate when rushing from 34.1 percent to 52.4 percent, Brown also improved his receiving yards per game from 13.0 to 22.5. Whether due to him maturing as a receiver or the coaching staff better implementing him into the passing game, his ability to get yards is not in question.
If Brown can stay a consistent presence in the backfield, it would increase the rest of the offense’s margin for error. If he can manage to take another leap, he could very well develop into one of the most effective backs in the league behind Burrow and these receivers.
Mike Hilton’s presence is going to be missed on the Bengals’ defensive unit, but Cam Taylor-Britt will be a big factor in how much. He’s now at a point in his career where a bigger leap is expected, and he’s going to have to step up if Cincinnati wants to have a competent defense.
Taylor-Britt has shown flashes of being an elite defensive back, but struggles to maintain consistency and often finds himself getting beaten by the league’s best receivers. If he can manage to be a difference maker every week, it will go a long way in covering up the glaring weaknesses of this defense.
Cincinnati already has its top two receivers established (Chase and Higgins), but if Andrei Iosivas continues to improve, he could turn an already elite offense into an unstoppable one. He’s shown exceptional footwork and a knack for making difficult catches, and has shown he can step into the number two role if injury demands.
Iosivas, listed at six feet three and weighing 215 lbs, can use his size to the team’s advantage. The Princeton product hasn’t been the best blocker in his first two seasons, but he’s looked much bigger this offseason than in years past.
Considering Trenton Irwin is now signed with the Jacksonville Jaguars, the drop-off in talent between the three best receivers and the rest on the roster is much more drastic. Since the Bengals can’t (and/or won’t) spend money on another receiver to alleviate this, Iosivas will have to step up this season if the Bengals want to be competitive.
Shemar Stewart, the Bengals’ 17th overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, has yet to play his first game for the Bengals. In fact, he has yet to even practice with the team.
Due to ongoing contract disputes between the team and his agent, Stewart hasn’t participated in the team’s minicamp. The team wants to set a new precedent for how guaranteed money is structured, and Stewart doesn’t feel this is indicative that the team has full faith in him.
Regardless of which party is in the right, the Bengals’ defense is in a dangerous spot. With them not paying Henderickson, releasing Pratt, and not wanting to fully commit to Stewart, they are ensuring fewer and fewer defensive players will choose to play in Cincinnati. Why go somewhere that won’t pay?
Not to mention the biggest concern with Stewart, which is that he’s relatively unproven. In 37 college games, he accrued 65 tackles, 11 tackles for a loss, and a total of 4.5 sacks.
How the Bengals handle Stewart’s contract situation may not just affect the on-field product this year, but the team’s ability to acquire legitimate defensive talent going forward. If the front office maneuvers poorly enough, they may just ensure this defense digs a hole too deep for even Burrow and Chase to drag the team out of.
A highly touted prospect that has yet to be given a real chance, Myles Murphy could have a huge impact on the Bengals’ season. Although Murphy’s only played a total of 658 snaps since joining the team (Hendrickson played 1,596 snaps in the same time), he’s shown what his impact can be.
In that time, Murphy racked up 20 combined tackles each season (10 and 11 solo in 2023 and 2024, respectively), missing a total of one tackle in his career. He had six quarterback pressures with three QB hits in 2023 and nine QB pressures with four QB hits in 2024.
Murphy makes the opposing QB’s life more difficult, and does so effectively and with efficiency. If the Bengals have any hope of mitigating the impact Henderickson’s departure will have, they have to rely on Murphy to step up, and that requires playing him.
Logan Wilson is one of the most consequential Bengals, not because he brings anything particularly special, but because he’s a steady presence that the Bengals defense will need to succeed. With the Bengals losing Pratt, there’s already going to be a glaring omission from last year’s squad, which was extremely problematic itself.
Wilson is coming off a knee injury that saw his season end early, so he could struggle compared to his usual output, at least to start. Even being the shortest season he’s played (11 games), he still put up 55 solo tackles, 104 combined tackles, and the second-most QB hits of his career (4).
Wilson may not be the most exciting player at his position, but he will need to be consistently good if the Bengals want to be successful. If he isn’t or if he sees a regression, the Bengals’ midfield will be picked on all season and put up another historically bad year.
Although the Bengals have Burrow, Chase, and Higgins secured, there are still a lot of things that need to go right for them to be successful next season. Along with luck breaking their way, they’re also going to need several players to step up.
While the three stars are the most valuable to the team, Brown, Taylor-Britt, Iosivas, Stewart, Murphy, and Wilson may be the most consequential. If they don’t play up to par, or even far exceed it in a couple of cases, the Bengals will struggle to put together a passable season.
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