The waiting game when it comes to details on the massive Joe Burrow contract extension with the Cincinnati Bengals has mercifully ended.
Portrayed as a five-year deal worth $275 million with $219 million in guarantees to make Burrow the highest-paid NFL player ever (for now), the full details finally paint the year-by-year picture.
Buy Bengals TicketsIn total and as explained earlier, this is actually a seven-year, $310 million contract for Burrow, as the five additional years tack on to the remaining two years of his rookie deal.
But, the Bengals got creative with how the money spreads out to the tune of six bonuses to help keep the cap hits manageable until that eyebrow-raising 2029 figure.
The cap hits, courtesy of Spotrac:
- 2023: $19.5M
- 2024: $29.7M
- 2025: $46.25M
- 2026: $48.25M
- 2027: $52.25M
- 2028: $53.5M
- 2029: $68.5M
- 2030: $9M (dead)
This is obviously an unprecedented deal for the Bengals, even when it comes to giving guarantees after Year 1. It’s something they might have to do a year from now when possibly extending Ja’Marr Chase (and perhaps Tee Higgins, too).
Like any mega-deal of this ilk, team and player will likely link back up in a few years and make an editing pass that creates cap space. But even now, the cap hits aren’t totally impossible to manage up to 2027 and the current structure in no way stops the team from locking down Chase, Higgins and others, too.
