4 positions Bengals should consider upgrading before trade deadline

If the 2021 season were to end today, the Cincinnati Bengals would be the No. 1 seed in the AFC. This means they’d have a first-round BYE and home-field advantage in the postseason.

No, this isn’t April Fool’s Day, it’s real life. The Bengals have been red-hot to start the 2021 season and now they have some big decisions to make as the trade deadline inches closer. For the first time in a few years, the Bengals won’t be sellers at the deadline but they have to decide if they want to be buyers.

If the Bengals do decide they want to buy before the deadline gets here, what positions do they need to address? Let’s take a looky-loo.

Positions for Bengals to upgrade

4. Tight End

C.J. Uzomah has been surprisingly good this season and that’s why I hesitated with putting the tight end position on this list. With that said, Uzomah is in the final year of his contract, and trading for a tight end could pay dividends not only this year but in the future as well.

Drew Sample is a decent blocking tight end but he’s not going to be the pass-catching threat this organization hoped he’d be when they spent a second-rounder on him two years ago. That’s why targeting someone who’s not in a contract year (Blake Jarwin, Dan Arnold, Jack Doyle) could be a smart move for this team, as they’d have them past the 2021 season.

The typical thing to do is target players who are in the final year of their deal and if that’s what the team wants to do, there are plenty of tight ends nearing the end of their contract who Cincinnati could add (Evan Engram, Gerald Everett, O.J. Howard, Hayden Hurst, etc). This would then give them two tight ends whose contracts are expiring and could piss off Uzomah in the process.

I’m not opposed to adding another tight end but the Bengals have to be smart about it if they’re going to pull it off. Extending Uzomah is looking more and more like a move this team needs to make so the position might end up staying put.