The Cincinnati Bengals are in a position they haven’t occupied for a long time. Their bid to be seen as contenders is now being taken seriously—and how can it not, when they just nearly won the Super Bowl? But there’s always a price to pay for success, and when you’re talking about sports, it’s money.
Winning often and winning consistently requires that you have a talented roster, and talent gets paid. Talent that produces wins gets paid even better. And the prevailing thought that colors the Bengals’ entire offseason is the reality that they will, eventually, have to accommodate a future massive quarterback contract, which has a good chance to be record-breaking, for third-year quarterback Joe Burrow.