The Bengals Have 4 Players Making A SERIOUS Roster Push...

John Sheeran breaks down four Bengals who are making a legitimate late push for roster spots after training camp and Cincinnati's preseason opener against the Detroit Lions: Jacob Bayer, Swayze Bozeman, Kendall Milton and Russ Yeast.

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Video Transcript

The Bengals roster looks pretty set at the moment, but there may be a handful of players who could make a last-minute push.

I'm John Scheuren of A to Z Sports Cincinnati.

This is A to Z Sports Cincinnati, covering your Cincinnati Bengals throughout the 2026 pre-season.

So it was this time last week, a handful of days leading up to the Bengals' first pre-season game against the Detroit Lions, where the Bengals released their first official depth chart of 2026.

And as we all know, that depth chart is mostly BS.

Not mostly, I shouldn't say mostly.

The starting line-ups are essentially completely accurate, and for the most part, the reserves are in the correct order.

But it's not carefully put together by the coaching staff, it's mainly just put together by the communications department.

It's just something for the team to officially release, but very rarely, in fact never, is it ever 100% accurate.

And you can typically pick out where the inaccuracies lie after watching the first pre-season game because more times than not, there are gonna be players coming in for the starters later in the game, and you're like, "Wait a minute, I thought he was buried much deeper on the depth chart.

Why is he playing over this guy?"

And that's because Cincinnati's depth chart and the 31 other depth charts in the NFL are not what you see online.

But if you want an accurate representation about who is likely to make the team to round out the 53-man roster, look no further than who actually plays in the games rather than who is listed down on a piece of paper.

And now that we're a few days removed from the first pre-season game, we seem to have a better idea about who is actually pushing to make one of these last roster spots for the Bengals.

And to me, there are four players specifically who I think have a much better shot at making the team now than I would've said at the beginning of training camp, all because the work that they've put in training camp and what they did in the first pre-season game with the opportunities that they were given, it makes me feel a lot better about their chances at actually making the team.

For starters, I do have to give credit, and I do have to spotlight Jacob Bayer for the first time this off-season, because he has been the backup center for the vast majority of the off-season program.

Even in training camp, when Connor Liew, the team's fourth round pick from this year's NFL draft, you know, he started training camp practicing, you know, he wasn't, you know, on the, any injury list, despite coming off of a torn ACL.

And Liew has been increasing his reps in practice, and he's listed as the backup center on the depth chart, but the first center to come off the bench after Ted Karras was Jacob Bayer, just like it has been for the majority of the off-season.

And he looked pretty good at the center position.

And maybe most importantly, he didn't just play center on Thursday night.

In the fourth quarter, Brian Parker II, he took over for center when the third and fourth string players of the offense came in, and Jacob Bayer moved over to left guard.

And I think that's important because Bayer has mostly just been a center for his very brief NFL career.

If he can have multi-positional versatility and play well at multiple spots, and again, I thought he played pretty well on Thursday night compared to some other players for the Bengals offensive line, that does, in my opinion, give him a pretty good chance at maybe cracking the last spot for this Bengals offensive line.

It's a group that needs to be at least nine, maybe even 10 players deep, and I think Bayer is one of the 10 best offensive linemen the Bengals have right now.

I do think once the regular season comes around, and if something unfortunate happens to Ted Karras, then Connor Liew is going to get that first call to replace him.

I think by then he's gonna have enough playing time in the pre-season.

I expect him to play in at least in one of these two pre-season games, enough practice time to really take over.

And ultimately, he is the more talented player, albeit a little bit younger.

But Bayer, again, if he has that versatility and he has a lot of experience snapping, he gives them even more depth at a very important position in which you need multiple guys that can do that job that the center has.

And I think this is even more emphasized when neither Cody Ford or Jalen Rivers look particularly impressive against second stringers on Thursday.

Jalen Rivers specifically had just a, an atrocious rep at right guard.

He's been the backup right guard for basically all of training camp.

He was even getting some snaps at left tackle last week in training camp when, you know, Cody Ford was taking snaps, some snaps at guard.

So they're not really sure what to do with both of those guys because neither one is really running away, to be, like, the hands down first offensive lineman off the bench at their respective positions.

So if Bayer, again, if he proves to continue to be stable and solid at multiple spots, then maybe one of Ford or Rivers doesn't make the cut and Bayer ends up taking one of their spots.

One of the biggest surprises that I saw from Thursday was the fact that Swayze Bozeman was lined up next to Oren Burks as the Bengals second string linebackers.

Again, like, they're only gonna have two linebackers on the field, like, 90% of the time.

So if you are within the top four, you are considered a backup and you, you have, like, a, a role to be played if one of the starters goes down.

And Bozeman was a guy on the depth chart that was listed as, like, a fifth or the sixth guy in the position group behind Joe Giles-Harris, who I still think is going to make the team just because of how experienced and how effective he is on special teams.

But Bozeman also has special team experience, and I think if they want a true backup to either Demetrius Knight or Barrett Carter who's not Oren Burks, then Bozeman looks like that guy right now.

And again, I thought he played pretty well on Thursday night.

Didn't make any, like, splash plays necessarily, but stayed in position, was around the ball when he needed to be.

And if they feel like he is one of their top four true linebackers on the team right now, on a position group that's most likely to have about five when the 53 man roster gets settled, I think he has a good chance or a better chance now than he did maybe last week.

All off-season, we've talked about linebacker and what the Bengals can do more to fortify that position.

Bobby Wagner's obviously still out there among other veterans who wouldn't cost the Bengals that much to bring in.

Bozeman is the only veteran, I guess veteran is a loose term.

He's played a couple of years, but I don't think he's accrued enough experience to be considered an NFL veteran.

He's the only guy who's played in the NFL before signing with the Bengals or been claimed by the Bengals this year to have joined the Bengals at the linebacker position.

I don't think anyone expected that to be the case when free agency began, that Swayze Bozeman was gonna be the only guy with experience joining the team, but it would be something if he were to make the team as a, quote-unquote, "veteran addition".

But as of right now, Bozeman would make the team in my latest projection along with Giles Harris to round out the linebacker room.

I think his biggest competition is gonna be the likes of Shaka Hayward and the undrafted guys Eric Gentry and Jack Dingle, who hardly even played on Thursday.

So yes, it is time to take the Bengals' lone addition to the linebacker room a little bit more serious.

I touched on this during our live recap of the game from Thursday night.

The biggest weakness that we haven't really talked about on the Bengals roster is their depth at running back, both long-term with contract situations needing to be sorted out with Chase Brown and potentially Samaje Perine, and in the short-term because behind those two players you have Taj Brooks, who has shown basically nothing through two years after being drafted in the sixth round last year.

Remember, he was billed as a steal for a sixth-round pick and someone that I was quite impressed with, you know, when he was in college at Texas Tech.

But again, he hasn't done anything to really separate himself from the other running backs on the Bengals roster, including Kendall Milton, who touched the ball more than any Bengals skill player did on Thursday night, aside from the quarterbacks.

Now, on the surface, Milton's production wasn't that impressive.

He carried the ball 10 times for 21 yards, and he even fumbled one of his carries that was, like, a broken play from the beginning.

Jacob Baird, like, mishandled the snap, and it kind of just rolled to Milton, and he never really got a good grip on the ball, and he ended up fumbling, really close to the end zone.

But in those 21 yards, he did force three missed tackles, and Pro Football Focus credited him for 27 yards after contact, which is by far the most out of any Bengals ball carrier.

So he was doing more with the blocking that he was given compared to any other Bengals running back on Thursday night, and I think he was creating more yards on his own.

He was running hard.

He had a couple of good examples of that.

Again, the sample size is not very big from th- this past game, but compared to what the Bengals have right now, which is not a very inspiring group of tailbacks behind Chase Brown and Samaje Perine, there is a decent chance, in my opinion, that Milton could beat out Taj Brooks for that role.

I think special teams is obviously gonna be a major factor in this as well, and if they like Brooks enough for that role and they still wanna believe that he can get better as a ball carrier when he gets th- those opportunities, then yeah, maybe Brooks just ends up staying around as the former draft pick himself.

But Kendall Milton was an undrafted free agent signing out of Georgia by the Philadelphia Eagles.

The Eagles obviously had a great running back room a couple years ago when they, you know, brought him in initially.

And he's been with the Bengals practice squad for the last year now.

So I'm, I'm not saying this is impossible, but it was notable for him to get all those opportunities compared to every other running back on the Bengals roster.

Now, compared to those other three players, Russ Yeast may have the smallest chance of actually making the team as a safety, because the hierarchy of the Bengals safety room is pretty clear right now.

You have Brian Cook and Jordan Battle as your starters, and Kyle Dugger as the backup for Cook, and PJ Jules as the backup for Jordan Battle.

PJ Jules is very valuable and notable in that room because of how much special team experience he accrued last year and how much he has grown, and now he's trustworthy as one of the four players of this position group.

Russ Yeast is either fifth or sixth on the depth chart right now, so it's going to be tough for him to overtake Jules without, you know, completely wowing everyone on special teams.

But making plays on defense is a good way to make that impression, and of course, he did have the game-winning interception against the Lions late in the fourth quarter.

And what's notable here is that Yeast is not new to this.

He's very true to this.

He was a starter for the Rams back in 2023, who replaced Nick Scott, who of course signed with the Bengals earlier in that off-season.

And he was a pretty decent player, and he's been with the Bengals for, for the last year on the practice squad.

But having that NFL experience, rounding out this position group, and then making plays in the limited chances that he got on Thursday, that is a good start for him to potentially push PJ Jules for that final safety spot.

I don't think there's enough room on this roster to keep five safeties, so it's gonna have to be either him or Jules.

And if the Bengals want maybe take the best natural safety, then Yeast may have that argument.

But this position, again, like we saw for Tyson Anderson for the last couple years, it doesn't really matter what you do as just a true safety on defense, but it's all about special teams.

This position's value is surrounded by special teams value.

And PJ Jules still has the edge right now, but if Russ Yeast continues to prove undeniable and does well enough on special teams over these last two preseason games, maybe he does have a chance.

The Bengals have 13 days until final cuts are to be finalized for the NFL.

It's a new time this year.

It's Sunday night, I believe, at 6:00 PM Eastern Standard Time.

So cuts will be rolling in all throughout that day.

After the Bengals have two more preseason games, which all four of these guys are gonna have to make the most of if they wanna make the 53-man roster.

Obviously, I did not touch on the likes of Dante Myers in this video.

I covered him pretty extensively on, for articles at azsports.com, and he seems to be the camp darling who has the good chance of making the team.

But in terms of just what the depth chart looked like and where the opportunities went, these four really stood out.

But who do you think I missed on this list?

Let me know down in the comments below.

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