For years, the Cincinnati Bengals have refused to give major extensions to three of their star players: Ja’Marr Chase, Tee Higgins and Trey Hendrickson. Higgins has now been franchise-tagged in back-to-back seasons while Chase is set to play out his fifth-year option before hitting unrestricted free agency in 2026.
So what’s happening on the Hendrickson front? Well, the defensive end requested a trade in the 2024 offseason before the Bengals gave him a short-term contract adjustment to have him return to the team. The following season, Hendrickson not only played up to his contract standard but actually led the NFL in sacks with 17 last year.
The Bengals are not budging on their financial commitment to him, though, so on Thursday the team, in place of another short-term raise, reportedly told the pass-rusher that he’s allowed to search for a trade, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter. It’s uncertain how much it would take to secure the right to sign Hendrickson to a major contract, but at age 30 it would probably be a third-round pick or less.
Hendrickson came up in our study of free-agent edge rushers this offseason. The pass rusher had better pressure production than all of the expected 2025 free agents and only ranked second in the league, behind the Dallas Cowboys’ Micah Parsons, over the last two years in that metric.
Who knows how long he will stay in his prime, but at the moment, Hendrickson is a difference-making pass-rusher. The Green Bay Packers are in desperate need of one of those opposite of Rashan Gary after Preston Smith failed to make a successful transition to the 4-3 defense and former first-round pick Lukas Van Ness has only marginally progressed over his first two years as a professional.