Shemar Stewart Calls Out Bengals Front Office Amid Contract Standoff, 'I'm 100% Right'

Cincinnati Bengals rookie Shemar Stewart vented his frustration with the team as negotiations over his contract continue to drag on.

Stewart told reporters he's "100 percent right" in terms of his demands, adding he isn't requesting for the Bengals to set a new precedent with his deal. The first-round pick asserted the hang-up is "something very simple to fix":

Rookie holdouts aren't totally uncommon. The collective bargaining agreement sets the broad terms for what every draft pick stands to collect, but some of the finer details can require a bit of compromise.

Pro Football Talk's Mike Florio reported in May that Stewart's representatives and the Bengals are at odds over a provision that would allow the team to void some of his guaranteed money.

"Per a source with knowledge of the situation, the Bengals want to include a phrase that causes a default in the current year to trigger a default in all remaining years," Florio wrote. "The problem is that the contract signed by last year's first-round pick, tackle Amarius Mims, does not not include the language that the Bengals are now attempting to insert into Stewart's deal. And Mims was taken one spot lower in 2024 (No. 18) than Stewart was picked in 2025 (No. 17)."

Florio noted other teams have written similar language into their contracts, so the Bengals wouldn't be alone there. He also said, however, other franchises typically pay more of a player's signing bonus up front than Cincinnati.

Giving quarterback Joe Burrow and wide receivers Ja'Marr Chase and Tee Higgins massive extensions sent a symbolic message to some degree. Whatever reputation ownership had in the past, it's committed to winning now.

But the standoffs with Stewart and fellow edge-rusher Trey Hendrickson are undoing a lot of the progress toward improving the organization's image. The situation with Stewart looks especially bad because rookie contracts across the board are below market value. It's impossible not to look cheap when driving this hard a bargain.