If center Billy Price is back with the Bengals in 2022, it won’t be on the fifth-year option on his rookie deal.
Price was the 21st pick of the 2018 draft, but Adam Schefter of ESPN reports that the team will not exercise their option on his contract. Price would have been guaranteed $10.413 million if the option was exercised.
Given Price’s role during his first three seasons in Cincinnati, it’s no surprise that the Bengals would opt against guaranteeing him that kind of money. Price started all 10 games he played as a rookie, but has made just nine starts while appearing in every game over the last two seasons.
Only one of those starts came in 2020 and Price spent the rest of the year backing up Trey Hopkins.