No excuses for Mikey

[Cbus cardsfan]

Many times, I see people make the excuse for Bidwill that he's "cash poor" compared to other owners and, thus, makes it harder for him to keep or sign free agents. I've called bunk on this from day 1. All owners are billionaires, and money is never an issue, only a convenient excuse.

Mike Brown and the Bengals have proven that to be the case. Brown is the least wealthy owner in the league. Yet, in the last 2 years he's made Joe Burrow the highest paid, at the time, QB in the league, just made JaMarr Chase the highest paid non-QB in the league, re-signed Tee Higgins to make him the highest paid #2 WR in the league, and in the near future, is reportedly going sign Trey Hendrickson to an extension making him one the highest paid DE's in the league.

This all from the reported cheapest owner in the NFL who, like Bidwill, has the NFL as their only business and family owned. The excuses are crap, and the salary cap is another falsehood when it comes to retaining, acquiring talent as Chase's and Higgins cap # actually decreased for this season after signing their deals.

 

[phillycard]

Hard to wash that cheapness stench from this organization. How many times have we had to make the "hard" decisions to retain "real" talent? Fitz, Pat P, Budda? We didn't blink an eye when it came time to let B. Murph and Zach go. Problems like the eagles, Bengals, and Niners have recently experienced aren't relatable when it comes to us. We've been able to hide under the constant losing. I'm praying that changes and we see what he's really about.

 

[Stout]

Well, yeah.

 

[CardNots]

Many times, I see people make the excuse for Bidwill that he's "cash poor" compared to other owners and, thus, makes it harder for him to keep or sign free agents. I've called bunk on this from day 1. All owners are billionaires, and money is never an issue, only a convenient excuse.

Mike Brown and the Bengals have proven that to be the case. Brown is the least wealthy owner in the league. Yet, in the last 2 years he's made Joe Burrow the highest paid, at the time, QB in the league, just made JaMarr Chase the highest paid non-QB in the league, re-signed Tee Higgins to make him the highest paid #2 WR in the league, and in the near future, is reportedly going sign Trey Hendrickson to an extension making him one the highest paid DE's in the league.

This all from the reported cheapest owner in the NFL who, like Bidwill, has the NFL as their only business and family owned. The excuses are crap, and the salary cap is another falsehood when it comes to retaining, acquiring talent as Chase's and Higgins cap # actually decreased for this season after signing their deals.

Didn’t seem like Kyler’s contract was cheap at the time. Baker’s contract was pretty stout at the time of his signing as well.

Poor salary management has been a problem for this franchise but i do not agree owner wealth has the same impact today as previous decades.

I remember it being reported that Bill Bidwill said after the playoff win against the Cowboys that now players will want bigger salaries.

I really believe Bill was just cheap by nature not based on his lack of perceived wealth as an owner.

I’ve not seen this behavior from his son as i did with dad.

 

[kerouac9]

You have more options when working to keep players in-house. The current problem is that we don't have enough good players, so we aren't really concerned about losing them.

Under today's CBA, it sure feels like top-line free agency help is going to be less accessible.

Our pending 2026 free agents of note are McBride, Jonah Williams, and Kelvin Beachum.

 

[kerouac9]

I remember it being reported that Bill Bidwill said after the playoff win against the Cowboys that now players will want bigger salaries.

That was also nearly 30 years ago and I'm not sure how relevant it is to today's business operations.

"The disease of me" is real, but it doesn't have anything to do with fiscal conservatism on the side of the owner.

I don't believe that the Bidwill family are cash flow constrained, but I do believe they're unwilling to stretch themselves financially. That said, they haven't really had reason to since the first year DHop was here -- the team hasn't been good enough to justify it.

 

[football karma]

I don't believe that the Bidwill family are cash flow constrained,

My guess is that the two covid years probably pinched them more than the higher revenue nfl teams--

and that the financial demands of the family (my speculation) always take priority

but i also think on pure dollars in vs dollars out: for the last two years, the team has more than made up for whatever losses they suffered during the covid years: basically regular revenue while having a really low payroll.

Kliff and Steve finding jobs also helped -- and they will roll off after this year (IIRC)

 

[BACH]

Not defending Bidwill in any way - the “report card” speaks for itself.

But as K9 points out, it’s not as simple as this. The cap space is increasing so much that Free Agency is changing.

Monti tried hard to sign 3 players from the absolut top of the FA rankings to long term deals. He only actually signed one (Sweat). Not giving credit for effort, but to me it shows a couple of things. And the best available in this new free agency. Big names with declining production is not the answer to build sustainable success.

- Monti wants to spend money smart. Sweat, Williams and Fries. Young players that are above average at their position. These are the player types that he is happy to sign and spend big on.

It also indicates that Bidwill was probably not holding back on spending big. Williams and Fries just didn’t want to sign here - for whatever the reason might be.

I get the frustration and I myself am also left with a bit of “meh” feeling when looking at all the cap available and looking at what was signed.

But comparing it to what e.g. the Patriots did, I do prefer this over overpaying for underwhelming players.

This was the 1st period of 5 periods to improve the team. This was IMO a B-/C+ grade. There are 4 more rounds of this to get better or worse.

 

[BulldogCard]

Had to get not good enough to bother. The decisions or lack of that got you there. Why are you at a point where why bother. Because of cheapness, bad scouting and decisions. Contracts that were pretty bad, punitive.

 

[Ronin]

We need better decision making from the FO. I think it would be easier to make decisions. Jmo

 

[kerouac9]

We need better decision making from the FO. I think it would be easier to make decisions. Jmo

It would be easier to field a better team if we had better players.

 

[oaken1]

It would be easier to field a better team if we had better players.

right? how does the team not understand that?

 

[DaHilg]

Not defending Bidwill in any way - the “report card” speaks for itself.

But as K9 points out, it’s not as simple as this. The cap space is increasing so much that Free Agency is changing.

Monti tried hard to sign 3 players from the absolut top of the FA rankings to long term deals. He only actually signed one (Sweat). Not giving credit for effort, but to me it shows a couple of things. And the best available in this new free agency. Big names with declining production is not the answer to build sustainable success.

- Monti wants to spend money smart. Sweat, Williams and Fries. Young players that are above average at their position. These are the player types that he is happy to sign and spend big on.

It also indicates that Bidwill was probably not holding back on spending big. Williams and Fries just didn’t want to sign here - for whatever the reason might be.

I get the frustration and I myself am also left with a bit of “meh” feeling when looking at all the cap available and looking at what was signed.

But comparing it to what e.g. the Patriots did, I do prefer this over overpaying for underwhelming players.

This was the 1st period of 5 periods to improve the team. This was IMO a B-/C+ grade. There are 4 more rounds of this to get better or worse.

Strong disagree with this take.. teams have shown sustainability through trades and FA. Most glaring example is the Rams. Our off-season as been pathetic this far for a year 3 rebuild. Teams consistently turn it around faster than that.

I posted an analysis on here awhile back ago… teams who drafted 1st, so the worse teams in the league made it to the playoffs 80% of the time within 3 years.