Ocho Cinco Still Threatening To Sit Out Bengals' Season?

Disgruntled Cincinnati Bengals’ wide receiver, Chad Johnson, has decided to skip his current team’s voluntary offseason workouts that began today. Johnson has attended the workouts in recent years but is not attending this year because he is still hoping that the Bengals will trade him. Head Coach, Marvin Lewis, has repeatedly stated this offseason that the Bengals will not trade Johnson though.

This is an interesting situation on different levels to me. I am surprised that Marvin Lewis still has the head coaching job in Cincinnati to begin with, after two poor seasons in a row where the team has failed to qualify for postseason play despite winning the division with essentially the same team in tact from back in 2005. If the Bengals had not been such a joke through the 90's, and really since their inception into the NFL, Lewis probably would have been fired by now in all honesty but has been given one last chance for this upcoming season because he is viewed as someone who has brought the concept of “winning football” to Cincinnati. Despite the poor results he has gotten on the field, the largest problem that the organization has had, is the numerous off field problems that many of the organization’s players have been involved in over the past two seasons. The Bengals have been more so known for the bad things that they have done off the field than the bad things they have done on the field over the past few seasons. It does not make sense to me how someone who knows their job is gone if they do not make the playoffs this year, only won seven games last year, has not had any big upgrades over the offseason, can be adamant about refusing to trade a player who does not want to play for the organization anyways?

The Redskins, Cowboys, Eagles, and probably a handful of other teams would be interested if Lewis were to make Johnson available at some point. All three teams would be considered the favorite to finish at the top of the NFC, if they were to land the loud-talking wide receiver in their respective cities. I can understand that the Bengals are reluctant to part with one of the best five wide receivers in the NFL, but when your job is on the line as Lewis’ is, you do not have the luxury of being able to say that you will not consider any thing, much less trading your disgruntled wide receiver? If nothing else, they could probably rob the Redskins of their first three picks in April’s draft, and get them to pay the salary hit the team would take for trading Johnson. Those future players may not help Lewis, but whoever is coaching the team in a few seasons could benefit from such a deal for Johnson though.