Remember Dax Hilliard, the first-round draft pick of the Cincinnati Bengals who supposedly single-handedly annihilated any hope of Jessie Bates III continuing his career in the city beyond this season? Well, that’s still probably going to be true. But he shouldn’t have any impact on how Bates plays, or where, or when, during the 2022 season.
Even though the veteran safety skipped the vast majority of the offseason, and there was even talk that he could sit out the season entire after the two sides failed to work out a new deal by the July 15 deadline for players under the franchise tag, he has been ‘all in’ since reporting to camp, and his role is not expected to change at all—something the Bengals have been preparing for all along.