{"id":140899,"date":"2025-06-19T00:08:16","date_gmt":"2025-06-19T00:08:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/140899\/"},"modified":"2025-06-19T00:08:16","modified_gmt":"2025-06-19T00:08:16","slug":"bengals-afc-north-rival-signs-all-pro-cornerback","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/140899\/","title":{"rendered":"Bengals’ AFC North Rival Signs All-Pro Cornerback"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bengals’ AFC North Rival Signs All-Pro Cornerback<\/a> originally appeared on Athlon Sports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Cincinnati Bengals hope to somehow crawl back into contention in the AFC North next season after a disastrous 9-8 season that saw little go right on defense.<\/p>\n

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But that task may have just gotten a bit more difficult, as the rival Baltimore Ravens may have just gotten better.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, the Ravens announced the signing of free-agent All-Pro cornerback Jaire Alexander, who was recently waived by the Green Bay Packers as a salary cap casualty.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson pleaded with GM Eric DeCosta to please go sign his former college teammate with the Louisville Cardinals. He said it half-jokingly (kind of) to reporters.<\/p>\n

Just one day later, the Ravens made a reunion a reality with a one-year, $6 million deal.<\/p>\n

Baltimore ran away with the AFC North last season after the Pittsburgh Steelers ended the year with a stunning collapse with a five-game losing streak that included a wild-card loss to the Ravens.<\/p>\n

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Baltimore finished at 12-5 while the Steelers ended 10-7 with the Bengals at 9-8 and out of the AFC playoffs. The Cleveland Browns were a distant fourth at 3-14.<\/p>\n

The Bengals’ offseason has been plagued by negative press for holdouts of Trey Hendrickson and first-round draft pick Shemar Stewart with contract disputes.<\/p>\n

The team replaced former defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo with Al Golden, who enters his first season at the helm with an incredible amount of uncertainty.<\/p>\n

Hendrickson is entering the final year of his deal and wants a new contract as he’s coming off a career season with 17.5 sacks, 49 total tackles with 33 solo and 19 for loss. All career highs.<\/p>\n

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Stewart has yet to sign his rookie deal, as he disputes language in his contract that fails to give him injury protection, among other things.<\/p>\n

While the Bengals are seemingly losing the offseason, the Ravens have just gotten better.<\/p>\n

Related: Bengals Get Brutal Grade For One Major Reason<\/a><\/p>\n

Related: Bengals’ Impressive Ranking Leaves One Major Question<\/a><\/p>\n

This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports<\/a> on Jun 18, 2025, where it first appeared.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bengals’ AFC North Rival Signs All-Pro Cornerback originally appeared on Athlon Sports. The Cincinnati Bengals hope to somehow…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":123098,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2053],"tags":[1990,117,228,227,256,2296,54,7,345,5390,895,577,6,57,1496,2850,1503],"class_list":{"0":"post-140899","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cincinnati-bengals","8":"tag-afc-north","9":"tag-baltimore-ravens","10":"tag-bengals","11":"tag-cincinnati","12":"tag-cincinnati-bengals","13":"tag-cincinnatibengals","14":"tag-cleveland-browns","15":"tag-football","16":"tag-green-bay-packers","17":"tag-jaire-alexander","18":"tag-lamar-jackson","19":"tag-louisville-cardinals","20":"tag-nfl","21":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","22":"tag-shemar-stewart","23":"tag-the-ravens","24":"tag-trey-hendrickson"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114707123711987539","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/123098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}