Miami Dolphins Ramifications from Big Cincinnati Bengals Deals
The big NFL news over the weekend involved the Cincinnati Bengals splurging to retain wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins, and the moves had an effect on the Miami Dolphins.
The direct impact is that the task of defeating the Bengals when the teams face each other during the 2025 regular season became a lot more challenging than it would have been had Cincinnati been unable to keep Higgins because of financial considerations — Chase realistically never was going to go anywhere.
With Joe Burrow, Chase and Higgins, the Bengals have arguably the best QB-WR combination in the NFL.
The Dolphins have had one first-hand look at that trio, in the 2022 Thursday night game at Cincinnati that became more known for Tua Tagovailoa leaving the game in an ambulance as the result of a concussion.
On that night, Higgins and Chase burned the Dolphins for a combined 11 catches for 205 yards and a touchdown. It was Higgins who did most of the damage in that game with 124 yards, including a 59-yard score, while Chase merely won the triple crowd of receiver last season when he led the NFL in receptions, receiving yards and receiving touchdowns.
Of course, Cincinnati’s spending spree to keep Chase and Higgins — not to mention earlier re-signing former Dolphins tight end Mike Gesicki — should keep their offense among the best in the NFL, though they’ll now have limited resources to spend on defense.
And this is where we bring up that Cincinnati missed the playoffs in 2024 in large part because of four losses in games where the team scored 33 points or more.
The 2025 matchup between the Dolphins and Bengals is scheduled for Hard Rock Stadium, unless it gets chosen for Miami’s home game in Madrid, Spain.
The Dolphins are similar to the Bengals in that they have devoted a lot of resources for their passing game, in their case Tagovailoa, Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle.
In fact, Hill and Waddle represented the highest-earning wide receiver tandem in the NFL with an annual average of $58.25 million before they were overtaken by Chase and Higgins’ $68.75 million.
Before anyone suggests that paying that much for a QB and two wide receivers automatically prevents Super Bowl contention, we’ll just point out that the Philadelphia Eagles have the third-highest-earning wide receiver combo with A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith along with a QB who’s one of the 10 with an annual average salary of $50 million or more.
What matters for the Dolphins is getting their money’s worth out of Tagovailoa, Hill and Waddle.
For Tagovailoa, that means being able to stay in the lineup. For Hill and Waddle, that means performing and putting up big numbers regardless of who’s at quarterback.
The Dolphins’ expensive trio fell short in all aspects last season and that, more than anything else, led to the team missing the playoffs and finishing with a losing record for the first time since 2019.
So the money matters, but not as much as what the highly paid players do.
