The Cincinnati Bengals continue to open up additional salary cap space for the offseason by parting ways with veteran players.
First, the team released veteran defensive tackle Sheldon Rankins, and saved $9.6 million against the salary cap by doing so. Now, the Bengals have also officially released veteran guard Alex Cappa.
Cappa, who has seven years of experience in the league, signed with Cincinnati as an unrestricted free agent in the 2022 offseason. He spent the past three seasons with the Bengals and started in all 50 regular-season games that he appeared in for the franchise.
Bengals release veteran guard Alex Cappa after three seasons
Cappa had one year remaining on his contract for the Bengals, and was headed for unrestricted free agency in 2026. Now that he's been released, he'll be free to sign elsewhere this offseason.
Parting ways with Cappa will save the Bengals roughly $8 million against the salary cap. So, between releasing Rankins and Cappa, Cincinnati has opened up over $17 million that they can use to help re-sign key contributors like Ja'Marr Chase, Tee Higgins and Trey Hendrickson to long-term deals, or bring in some outside reinforcements.
Cincinnati desperately needs to improve the offensive line in front of star quarterback Joe Burrow, and parting ways with Cappa was a start. Though he was well-liked in the locker room, he had his fair share of struggles during his time with the Bengals.
Cappa allowed 15 sacks over the last three years, which is the third-most by any guard in the league. He also had a PFF pass-blocking grade of 55.2 during those three years, which ranked 64th out of 79 guards with at least 600 snaps, per NFL.com. In other words, he was allowing way too many pressures.
Given those stated struggles, it makes sense why Cincinnati would opt to move on from Cappa and save some money in the process.