Where Shemar Stewart Ranks Among Biggest Contract Blunders of the 2025 NFL Offseason

By Wednesday, all 32 NFL teams will have opened training camp for veterans. Yet one first-round rookie, Cincinnati Bengals defensive lineman Shemar Stewart, remains unsigned.

On Monday, Bengals director of player personnel Duke Tobin placed the blame for the contract impasse on the 21-year-old's representatives.

"I don't blame Shemar. He's listening to the advice he's paying for," Tobin told reporters. "I don't understand the advice… We're treating him fairly."

However, Stewart hasn't signed because Cincinnati wants to include void language that hasn't previously been a part of the team's first-round contracts. The Bengals only have themselves and their hard-line stance to blame for not having him under contract on the eve of training camp—and their inability to finalize a contract with a predetermined value based on draft slotting is a pretty significant blunder.

Where does it rank among the worst contract missteps of the 2025 offseason? Let's take a look.

5. Titans Give Dan Moore Jr. $20.5 Million Annually

AP Photo/George Walker IV

Dan Moore Jr.

Some bad contract decisions have involved not getting players under contract. This blunder, however, involves the Tennessee Titans and their decision to pay offensive tackle Dan Moore Jr. $82 million over four years.

This was a move that Bleacher Report's Gary Davenport called the worst of the offseason in May.

"The problem is that Moore has shown nothing to indicate over four years in the league that he can be a $20 million tackle," he wrote.

Indeed, the 26-year-old was a merely serviceable starter for the Pittsburgh Steelers before hitting the open market. Last season, he was responsible for five penalties and 12 sacks allowed, according to Pro Football Focus.

Yet, Moore falls at the bottom of today's list because, in a vacuum, signing him was logical. Tennessee knew it would use the No. 1 overall pick on quarterback Cam Ward, and it needed a new starting left tackle. The free-agent market was limited, and bad teams often overpay to add veteran talent.

Of course, that doesn't mean this was a smart contract, and it looks even worse after learning Laremy Tunsil was available via trade—the Houston Texans dealt the five-time Pro Bowler to the Washington Commanders.

It feels like the Titans were bidding against themselves here.

4. Jets Wait Until July to Sign Sauce Gardner

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Sauce Gardner

New York Jets cornerback Sauce Gardner seemed to regress a bit in his third NFL season—Pro Football Focus ranked him 46th overall among cornerbacks. But the Cincinnati product had appeared destined for a lucrative early extension ever since he was named Defensive Rookie of the Year in 2022.

The 24-year-old was also a first-team All-Pro in each of his first two seasons.

The Jets did eventually give Gardner his big second contract, signing him to a four-year, $120.4 million extension on July 15. He's now the highest-paid cornerback in NFL history, based on annual value.

Given his level of good-not-elite play in 2024, it's fair to wonder if he'll play up to his contract. There's no doubting, though, New York should have moved to sign him much earlier in the offseason.

Even with a slight 2024 regression considered, Gardner has shown himself worthy of a long-term deal. However, New York probably could have saved a considerable amount of money by finalizing it in the spring.

In early March, the Carolina Panthers made Jaycee Horn the league's highest-paid cornerback with a deal worth $25 million annually. The top of the market was raised later that month when the Texans signed Derek Stingley Jr. to a deal worth $30 million per year. Given the next-man-up nature of contracts, the Jets had little choice but to surpass Stingley's deal when extending Gardner.

Patrick Surtain II previously topped the market with a deal worth $24 million annually. Had New York signed Gardner at the onset of the offseason, they might have been able to ink him to a deal in the $25-26 million-per-year range. Waiting was a mistake, even if the team had more financial flexibility after the post-June 1 designation cuts of Aaron Rodgers and C.J. Mosley became official.

3. Cincinnati's Contract Standoff With Trey Hendrickson

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Trey Hendrickson

Not every contract standoff that could lead to a training camp holdout should be viewed as a blunder.

The Commanders, for example, have yet to extend wideout Terry McLaurin which has led to some public tension.

However, McLaurin will turn 30 in September and isn't expected to command a contract at the very top of the market. Washington needs to get him under contract, but it shouldn't be significantly impacted by extensions like Garrett Wilson's four-year, $130 million deal.

However, the Bengals have likely seen Trey Hendrickson's price tag go up substantially over the past few months. While he's 30, he's also the NFL's reigning sacks leader. And while he may not expect to top the edge-rusher market, he deserves a raise over the $21 million he's set to earn. That raise might not have been as substantial before the Bengals watched Maxx Crosby, Danielle Hunter, Myles Garrett and T.J. Watt take turns resetting the market—Watt now leads it with a deal worth $41 million.

According to NFL Media's Ian Rapoport, the Bengals have made "several offers, including a recent one" to Hendrickson. Maybe they will get him extended and into camp, but they probably could have done it for millions less by extending him months ago.

2. Saints Sign Chase Young to a $17 Million-Per-Year Deal

AP Photo/Adam Hunger

Chase Young

Compared to the contracts of players such as Garrett and Watt, Chase Young's three-year, $51 million extension feels reasonable. However, it was strange to see him get that sort of deal this offseason following another good-not-great season.

Young, to be clear, hasn't had anything resembling a "great" season since he was named Defensive Rookie of the Year in 2019. He had 7.5 sacks that season, a total he matched in 2023 while splitting time between the Commanders and San Francisco 49ers.

This past season, Young appeared in 17 games with the New Orleans Saints and finished with 5.5 sacks and eight tackles for loss. What made this a poor decision by New Orleans, though, was its cap situation.

The Saints entered free agency with several notable needs and a cap deficit. Though quarterback Derek Carr hadn't retired yet, New Orleans had a new head coach in Kellen Moore and knew it was approaching some semblance of a rebuild. Given Young's injury history and the state of the franchise, his extension represented a very unnecessary risk.

Now, the Saints did get some cap relief with Carr's post-draft retirement and now have $22.3 million in cap space available. However, they're also staring down the prospect of starting rookie quarterback Tyler Shough and could afford to invest more in his supporting cast—wide receiver Chris Olave is also extension-eligible.

Young is only 26 years old and still has the potential to develop into a dependable starter, but New Orleans' money would have been better spent elsewhere.

1. The Bengals Play the Blame Game with Shemar Stewart

AP Photo/Joe Maiorana, file

Shemar Stewart

Cincinnati's misguided dance with Stewart is significantly worse than its standoff with Hendrickson. The latter is an aging-but-still-productive veteran, and the Bengals need to find a balance between paying him for what he's done and paying for what he can do moving forward.

Stewart is a rookie who can only earn a set amount because of the way the NFL's rookie wage scale works. The Bengals want to include language that would allow them to void future guarantees in certain scenarios, language that hasn't existed in previous contracts. Stewart and his camp aren't having it.

"I think he's dug in on the language," ESPN's Adam Schefter told the Rothman & Ice podcast (h/t Chris Roling of Bengals Wire). "He doesn't want to be the first one and be made an example of."

The Bengals, meanwhile, have tried to paint Stewart's agent, Zac Hiller, as the unreasonable one.

"His agent wants it to be if he acted in a terrible fashion—this is all hypothetical—something that rises to the level of going to prison, we'd be on the line for the guarantee," franchise owner Mike Brown said, per Charlie Goldsmith of Fox19.

Is it unreasonable for a player who has never spent a down in the NFL to have contract demands? Perhaps. It's also unfair for the Bengals to change the way they construct contracts and expect their latest first-round pick to fall in line without any attempt at compromise. That's bad business by a notoriously cheap franchise, and it could hurt the Bengals in a big way.

Stewart was drafted because a defense that ranked 25th in points allowed last season needed a boost. Delaying his development over void language is a massive mistake.

If the Texas A&M product isn't ready to make an early rookie impact, the Bengals will have no one but themselves to blame.