Well, sometimes NFL mandatory minicamp can be interesting. The Cincinnati Bengals are the most recent source of June NFL Content™, currently having a back-and-forth with unsigned rookie defensive end Shemar Stewart that’s gotten so bad Stewart left minicamp early on Thursday.
Stewart is one of a handful of unsigned first-round picks, along with Travis Hunter, Jahdae Barron and Maxwell Hairston. However, none of those players have turned to the public for their negotiations with their new teams.
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That’s where Stewart has differed from his draft class brethren — and the Bengals have now caused Stewart to miss a bunch of valuable offseason opportunities.
According to Kelsey Conway of the Cincinnati Enquirer, Stewart would like his contract language to resemble the language of the Bengals’ recent first-round picks. Seems like a pretty innocuous request. Since the 2011 collective bargaining agreement instituted the rookie wage scale, there really isn’t much wiggle room for negotiation on these deals. The rookie contract holdout that used to be prevalent in the league prior to 2011 has largely been eliminated, leading to situations that appear to be as sour as Stewart’s becoming more and more rare.
“I’m 100 percent right. I’m not asking for nothing y’all have never done before,” Stewart said, according to Jay Morrison of Sports Illustrated. “But in y’all case, y’all just want to win arguments (more) than winning more games.”
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Stewart said he thought he would be on the field by now to start working on his game, but instead he missed mandatory minicamp and organized team activities while this contract situation resolves itself. Stewart was in meetings and studied his playbook, but he understandably avoided on-field work for now to decrease his risk of injury.
Assuming Stewart and his camp are being truthful in their side of events, there’s really no reason for the Bengals to be haggling like this. They have cap space. The 18th overall pick isn’t a very hefty contract. And, most importantly, Stewart really needs the practice reps in order to quickly live up to the standard of a first-round pick.
He didn’t have much by the way of college production at Texas A&M and clearly has a ways to go before becoming a down-to-down impact player in the NFL. The athleticism is there in droves, but daily practice reps are what a player like Stewart needs. Considering that the Bengals are going to be in a Super Bowl window as long as they have the offensive firepower they do, they need to get this across the finish line to have an important piece of their defense ready for training camp in July.
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Cincinnati also has a new defensive coordinator in Al Golden. Golden needs the defense at full strength if he’s going to be able to replicate in the NFL the success he had at Notre Dame last season. According to TruMedia, the Bengals were 30th in defensive success rate and 29th in expected points allowed per play. That’s not going to cut it if the Bengals want to reverse their luck from last year and get into the postseason that they barely missed last season.
Don’t miss the forest for the trees! This is a middle-of-the-first-round rookie contract! Just do a little capitulating, get it signed and keep it moving come training camp. It’s the best plan for everyone involved and removes a big distraction for a crucial season in Cincinnati.
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