6 players the Bengals were right to move on from in 2022

The Cincinnati Bengals had to make some difficult choices this offseason as far as who to keep and who to move on from. While some of those moves were difficult, the Bengals made the right decision by not keeping these players.

Adding three talented players to the offensive line meant that Cincinnati wasn’t going to be able to keep everyone on their Super Bowl roster and that’s not a bad thing by any means.

These six players made sense to move on from for one reason or another.

All contract details are courtesy of Spotrac and all stats are courtesy of Pro Football Reference.

6. Darius Phillips

The Bengals spent a fifth-round pick on Darius Phillips in the 2018 draft. The Western Michigan product was mostly a special teams contributor, returning both punts and kickoffs but he did see a significant amount of playing time on defense in 2020.

This past year, he didn’t play much on defense, appearing in just 11% of the defensive snaps while appearing in 38% of special teams snaps. Phillips had some struggles this past season, including fumbling a key return against the 49ers in a game that the stripes went on to lose in overtime.

Phillips ended the season on IR and it became pretty obvious that he wouldn’t be retained in the Queen City. He signed a one-year deal worth $1.5 million to join the Las Vegas Raiders and while it’s sad to see him go, it’s not the end of the world for Cincy.