Ask the columnist Jason Williams anything – sports or non -sports – and he will choose some of your questions and comments in his reception box and will answer on cincinnati.com. E-mail: [email protected]
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Message: There was a lot of media threshing in the offseason. It is enormous that the Bengals obtained contract extensions for (Ja’mar) Chase and (tee) Higgins. But the Bengals did very little in the free agency and their project was widely criticized. Looking at this coming season, I can’t help but ask myself: will they be better?
Answer: Bengals did not do enough to say with confidence that they will be an eliminatory team. It turned out to be a built -in off -season rather than going to try to join the AFC elite.
What a disappointment for Bengal fans, but no one should be surprised.
Bengal’s confusing project strategy and the transport of new players are exactly what you expect from an organization that has a skeletal screening service. Its free agency transport is exactly what you expect from an organization that hates spending money for players who do not play a quarter-arre and the wide receiver.
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The property has exerted more pressure on the evaluation service of players in sub-efficient by linking so much money in Joe Burrow, Chase and Higgins. Bengals must build their defense by the project and, well, good luck with that.
Cincinnati needed a safe starter of day 1 on the defensive line with his choice of draft in the first round – especially in a draft where the Bengals had only six choices and with as many holes to fill in defense. Bengals needed a guy who could dismiss the quarter.
Shemar Stewart spoke to the media at a press conference on April 25 after Bengals used the n ° 17 choice on the defensive of Texas A&M.
Instead, they took a project in the defensive Shemar Stewart, a guy who rarely dismissed the quarter-Arrière at university.
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Bengals have adopted better defensive line prospects such as defensive Oregon Derrick Harmon and Marshall Edge Rusher Mike Green. But of course, Harmon and Green were good enough for the northern Rivals of AFC Pittsburgh and Baltimore to write.
Go see what the chefs have done in the project. They have stars Chris Jones and George Karlaftis on the defensive line, and yet Kansas City has always used two of his first three choices on defensive line players.
Win in the trenches. Win a Lombardi trophy.
Meanwhile, the Bengals did not do anything in a free agency or the draft to improve safely, where Cincinnati has been unhappy since he let Jessie Bates leave the city in 2023. Bengals wasted a choice of sixth round on a ball carrier when they already have three veterans in a position they did not bring.
Bengals are counting on a new defensive coordinator to design a reversal on defense that still has massive holes, writes Jason Williams.
Perhaps the only position that Bengals improved this offseason is to the secondary, although they used a second round choice on Demantrius Knight Jr. in South Carolina, which they could probably have obtained in the third or fourth round. They obtained two seconds in the draft and signed the veteran Oren Burks, who won a Super Bowl ring in Philadelphia.
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In the end, the Bengals seem to enter the 2025 banking season on these two things that happen:
∎ The upgrade of opponents with Burrow, Chase and Higgins. How did it go last season?
∎ The new defensive coordinator Al Golden fixing the defense as if by. Fantastic coach, but he can only do so much with a defense that still has massive holes and is above all out of talented in addition to Trey Hendrickson.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Bengal improvement plan in 2025 NFL season? Joe Burrow, Al Golden
