With the Wild Card heartache still palpable on all levels of Paul Brown Stadium, the Bengals doubled down on the first day of free agency and rolled out about 10 percent of their 2016 salary cap numbers to retain Pro Bowl cornerback Adam Jones and starting safety George Iloka.
And even though they lost starting wide receiver Marvin Jones, they were prepared to give him one of their biggest March deals ever until word broke in the media Wednesday morning that Jones opted for Detroit. So they turned to Adam Jones and Iloka to get deals done.