Bengals Value Key Draft Factor Over More Salary Cap Space In 2026 Offseason

CINCINNATI — The Bengals love accumulating compensatory picks even though it's never led them to Super Bowl glory. That continued last week as The Athletic's Paul Dehner Jr. noted the team factored the compensatory pick formula into how it carried out the free agency plans.

Cincinnati signed three major external free agents in Bryan Cook, Boye Mafe, and Jonathan Allen. Over The Cap's Nick Korte still has them slated to receive an extra third and seventh round pick in next year's draft because of their own free agency exits, including Trey Hendrickson to Baltimore.

Compensatory Pick HUNGRY

Cincinnati Bengals defensive end Trey Hendrickson (91) celebrates as time winds down in the fourth quarter of the NFL Week 1 game between the Cleveland Browns and the Cincinnati Bengals at Huntington Bank Field in Cleveland on Sunday, Sept. 7, 2025. The Bengals begin the season with a 17-16 win over the Browns. | Sam Greene/The Enquirer / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The Bengals once again chose to value compensatory picks and higher salary cap hits over lower cap hits and higher cash spending that would give them more active cap space than they are operating with.

This is a franchise employing arguably the best passer on the planet in Joe Burrow, and they currently rank 13th in Over The Cap's total cash spending tracking. Burrow's peers in Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson all have teams spending more cash than Cincinnati this offseason.

The lone time Cincinnati spent among the top 10 teams in total cash during the Burrow era was in his 2020 rookie season (ninth-highest cash spend) and the 2021 season (eighth-highest cash spend), when they went to the only Super Bowl the franchise has played in this century.

"For all the talk of the tag-and-trade approach with Trey Hendrickson, the Bengals ensured they would end up with a third-round pick upon his departure," Dehner wrote this week. "By signing Allen, released last week by Minnesota, as their last big addition, they end up in the positive of the projected comp-pick formula, according to comp pick wizard Nick Korte at Over The Cap. Korte has the Bengals slotted to receive a third and seventh next year.

"If Cincinnati had, say, signed John Franklin-Myers, whose contract expired with Denver, instead of the released Allen, it would have nullified the Hendrickson pick. Those decisions don’t necessarily drive major decisions, but they do factor in. Fair to surmise they did here."

The key caveat for the Allen signing not affecting the compensatory pick formula is that he was released and not an expired contract free agent. Anything the Bengals can do to be cap compliant and avoid any possible major dead money down the line will be done. They refuse to maximize the prime years of Burrow, Ja'Marr Chase, and Tee Higgins.

Operating as a higher cap spend over cash team means Cincinnati really views its cap space close to $20 million, rather than the raw $31.3 million Over The Cap shows they have as of this writing.

X user Codiki broke down the operation below:

Bryan Cook
3 years 40 million
2026 Cap hit 10.67 million

Bradley Chubb
3 years 40 million
2026 Cap hit 6.5 million

Jaelan Phillips
4 years 120 million
2026 Cap hit 9.99 million

Boys Mafe
3 years 60 million
2026 cap hit 17 million

They paid 10 million more in 2026 cap hit…
— Codiki (@codiki) March 15, 2026

Check out the full piece from Dehner Jr. here.

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