The Bengals Have A HUGE Ja'Marr Chase Decision Coming...
John Sheeran breaks down the latest Bengals roster updates, including Tanner Hudson returning to the practice squad, the remaining practice squad decisions, Ja'Marr Chase's injury status and Dax Hill returning to practice before the regular season opener against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Video Transcript
The Cincinnati Bengals have their initial 53-man roster, but what comes next?
I'm John Sheeran of A to Z Sports, Cincinnati.
This is A to Z Sports, Cincinnati, covering your Cincinnati Bengals leading up to the 2026 regular season.
Now, the obvious answer to that question is, well, the regular season comes next.
The Bengals play the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday, September 13th.
They're opening in orange once again, and then they're gonna go on the road against the Houston Texans.
Pittsburgh Steelers come after that, Jacksonville Jaguars.
The regular season is literally right around the corner, and the Bengals have their roster set.
But there are still some things that need to be checked on and need to be accomplished before week one comes around.
And there's also an opportunity for you guys, the fans, to be decked out in a brand-new Bengals jersey before week one arrives.
That's right, A to Z Sports, Cincinnati is giving away a brand-new Bengals jersey, completely customizable to your choosing, the size, the player name, the color, whatever you want.
All you gotta do is follow the steps here on the screen.
Comment down below your Bengals season record prediction for the 2026 season, and then click the link in the description to add A to Z Sports as your preferred Google source.
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As for the Bengals themselves, well, they're not done yet.
The Bengals announced their initial 11-player practice squad Monday evening.
It included 11 players from their 90-man off-season roster.
No new additions from other teams, but that is set to change in the coming hours, if not minutes, as I'm recording this.
And they will eventually get to very close or the maximum 16 player limit by the time week one rolls around, and Tuesday morning we did learn about some new additions as well.
The most predictable thing after the Bengals claimed offensive tackle Miles Hinton and released Tanner Hudson was Hudson coming back to the Bengals on the practice squad, and sure enough, that's exactly what happened.
It was a bit surprising when the Bengals released Hudson in order to fit in Miles Hinton, because Hudson did not play in that final pre-season game against the Eagles, Hinton's Eagles, actually, and that seemed to be an indicat- indicator that he was very much safe to make the 53-man roster.
But it turns out he was kept around just so that they could have a player that they could easily boot off the team in order to fit in any waiver claim that they were able to make, and it ended up being Miles Hinton as that guy who now joins the team.
But because Hudson is a vested veteran, I believe he has six accrued seasons, anyone over four accrued seasons is considered a vested veteran and does not have to enter waivers.
And what that means is a lot of the majority of players who end up getting cut, by teams this past weekend ended up going through waivers, and every single team had the opportunity to claim that player with their original contract, and the team that cut them, would not be able to get them back.
But with Tanner Hudson as a vested veteran, he does not have to enter waivers.
Because he has accrued enough experience, he can just enter free agency immediately and sign with whomever he pleases and chooses.
And it turns out that I would imagine that the Bengals had some sort of a handshake deal with Tanner Hudson.
They probably told him that, "You're gonna make the team, but there's a possibility that you're going to be released if we are able to get a player that we want off the waiver wire, and we would love to have you back on the practice squad."
Hudson did have the opportunity to sign with another team.
I know, our Cleveland Browns beat reporter, Brandon Little, said that the Browns should have had interest in him as they only have a handful or just a couple of active h- tight ends on the roster, and obviously the Browns have a lot of familiarity playing against Hudson over these last few years.
But it seems like he is most comfortable being in this scheme.
At 31 years old, he's only been with the Bengals ever since late in 2022 when he was first signed to the practice squad.
The Bengals have relied on him when they've needed him as this basically perfect backup for Mike Gesicki as the receiving tight end.
And now that he's on the practice squad, he is able to play a maximum of three games of just being elevated off the practice squad.
If they're going to play him more, he will have to be signed to the active roster.
The Bengals have four tight ends.
Injuries could happen in that position.
It's a position that does get banged up quite often.
So Hudson is now able to be elevated or just signed onto the active roster if he is needed.
But for now, I'm really comfortable with the Bengals tight end room regardless.
Obviously, Gesicki is still there.
Drew Sample is your starter as the inline Y blocking tight end.
Eric Gall, his role is only going to increase the more that they trust his health.
And then rookie Jack Endries is basically gonna take, Hudson's spot as what I would imagine is going to be the backup receiving tight end to Gesicki.
But also he does have that versatility of being an inline blocker and being able to line up both in the backfield, out wide as a receiver.
They can do anything with him, I think very similar to Eric Gall, which is why maybe Endries is the backup to Eric Gall when you think about it, and Mike Gesicki doesn't really have a backup on the active roster.
I think that's still probably Tanner Hudson when you look at all the players in the locker room.
Josh Johnson was also reported to join back on the pr- Bengals practice squad, which brings their unofficial tally to 14, as they have reportedly signed Garman Randolph, a former Los Angeles Chargers defensive end, to the practice squad as well.
So the official number for the Bengals is going to be 13, but the unofficial is 14, which means they have two open spots left that I do expect to be filled sometime within the next week or two.
The practice squad will figure itself out.
Regarding the players on the actual roster, I am focused on Ja'Marr Chase this week, and really next week as well.
Obviously, last week, Ja'Marr Chase went down very briefly with what ended up being a slight hyperextended knee.
It looked like it could've been a lot worse in which he landed on the ground and his foot kinda stuck in the grass.
That's one of those injuries in which if he was playing on turf, it could have ended up being a lot worse.
But Ja'Marr Chase is a very durable player, and he came out fine.
But he still didn't practice at the end of that practice, and I don't believe he practiced, the day afterwards, right before the Bengals took on the Philadelphia Eagles in the pre-season finale.
How much does Ja'Marr Chase practice this week and next week leading up to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers game?
Do the Bengals, you know, just reserve him just a little bit?
Maybe he's limited in a lot of these practices.
Maybe he does take a little bit of time off just to make sure that his knee is completely right.
That is just something for me to monitor, and for all of us to monitor really, whether or not Ja'Marr Chase is going to be a full participant and really a full active member of week one.
And I'm really only bringing this up because it's been a full week since the injury.
We haven't really gotten an update on it because Zac Taylor and the Bengals are not, you know, they don't have to provide an update right now with the regular season still another week away.
There are no practice reports, but hyperextended knees can vary in degrees of severity.
Obviously, Shamarr Stewart is still on the mend from his hyperextended knee that he suffered at the very end of July, so it's been a full month without having Shamarr Stewart in practice.
He's been working away on the rehab field, and he's probably more likely to miss week one rather than Ja'Marr Chase.
I'm just interested to see what their plan is for reintegrating Chase back after his brief absence, and whether or not this is something that he does need maybe a little bit more time than were expected, in terms of recovering from.
On a more positive side of news, Dax Hill did return to practice earlier this week as posted by the Bengals' social media account.
You saw Dax Hill in practice in uniform going up against, wide receivers in individual drills.
They were very clever in terms of how they shot, th- those clips and made sure that everyone saw that Dax Hill was back out there.
He hasn't really practiced in the last month with what people are calling a hamstring injury.
It's a soft tissue injury that was suffered in the dead heat of August.
Those are typically ailments that you want to give them as much time as possible to recover from.
You don't want them pushing through because those are issues that can linger into the regular season.
And especially for Dax Hill, who is now entering a contract year, you want the best version of himself when he takes the field in week one.
But returning to practice two weeks before week one rolls around I think was huge for him.
There might still be somewhat of a ramp-up period to make sure that, that he's ready to go.
And it wouldn't surprise me if he ends up, you know, rotating in and out with maybe a guy like Jakario Davis during that first game, just to make sure that, you know, he's not overworked and he doesn't, you know, re-pull his hamstring or whatever the case may be.
But it was a really positive sign to see him back on the practice field, and now makes the Bengals secondary as healthy as they possibly can be.
Brian Cook has al- already returned back to practice in at least some limited fashion, so all s- good signs for the Bengals secondary, both at cornerback and safety.
So Cincinnati's practice squad still needs to be completely filled out.
I still wonder if they are looking at potential trade options at offensive tackle.
They now have three backups with Hinton joining Javon Foster and Jalen Rivers.
How quickly does Hinton, you know, become a factor in practice in the rotation?
Where does he land on the depth chart?
Do they want to see if he can handle the second-stringers immediately, and maybe he does take over at swing tackle when week one rolls around?
How that competition evolves with them potentially still looking at external options with a possible trade, because this is the time of year in which the Bengals have completed player-for-player trade swaps in years past.
Is it going to come again?
I guess we'll have to wait and see.
There is still time in order to get some type of a deal to happen.
Obviously, almost exactly a year ago, this is when the Bengals signed Dalton Risner, and Risner was not expected to start in week one, but he ended up coming off the bench in the opening game of last season and ended up being obviously their starting right guard, and that's the position that he holds to this day.
So it is possible for some other addition outside of a practice squad signing to enter the equation here.
But obviously the closer that you get to week one, the less and less likely that becomes.
All the craziness so far has just died down.
We're gonna get into a little bit of a groove here, going back into the swing of things of the regular season schedule.
There are still some moves to be made, but we're gonna cover all of them in the coming days right here on A to Z Sports Cincinnati.
