AJ Green Extension a Win-Win for Everyone Involved, Especially Andy Dalton

The Bengals bellied up to the bar and paid the tab for A.J. Green—and nobody's happier about it than Andy Dalton.

Green has been the focal point of the Bengals offense since they drafted him No. 4 overall in 2011. The wideout has averaged 1,300 yards and nine touchdowns per 16 starts. Sent to the Pro Bowl after all four of his NFL seasons, he's been recognized as one of the very best in the business from the moment he stepped onto a professional field.

The price was high.

As the Cincinnati Enquirer's Jim Owczarski first reported, the deal is a four-year, $60 million extension, bringing his total deal to five years and $70 million. NFL Network's Ian Rapoport clarified that in the Bengals' urgency to get a deal signed before the season kicked off, they front-loaded the deal.

Though Green will line his pockets right away—and the average annual value of his new money would be second only to Calvin Johnson's 2012 blockbuster deal—this extension is in line with the going rate for top wideouts.

Dez Bryant, Demaryius Thomas and Julio Jones all signed five-year, (roughly) $70 million deals this summer. Rapoport indicated that Green's overall guarantees will come in a little lower, but the general framework is the same.

As NFL Network's Albert Breer shared on Twitter, Bengals offensive coordinator Hue Jackson gave the organization "kudos" for shelling out the cash that Green so obviously deserved:

From an organizational standpoint, the move makes plenty of sense.

With two great young backs in Jeremy Hill and Giovani Bernard, talented third-year tight end Tyler Eifert and having drafted three offensive linemen in the first five rounds (Russell Bodine, Jake Fisher, Cedric Ogbuehi) over the past two seasons, the foundation was already in place for the next generation of Bengals offense.

Locking Green up through 2019 cements every position on the Bengals offense—except one.

Dalton has had one of the best young careers in NFL history. He's started all 64 games the Bengals have played after drafting him in the round after Green, and with Green's help, Dalton has made two Pro Bowls himself.

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The problem is nearly every game Dalton plays is a referendum on whether or not he's actually been good this whole time.

Back in 2014, I wrote that his latest embarrassing playoff failure proved once and for all that he didn't have what it takes to lead the Bengals to the Super Bowl. In 2015, after playing some of the best football of his life, he took another January pratfall.

As noted by CBSSports.com's Ryan Wilson, Dalton is on what amounts to a pay-as-you-go contract. 

As long as he's playing well enough to keep the Bengals in contention, they'll keep paying him like a good-but-not-great starting quarterback. Whenever Bengals management really does sour on Dalton, he'll be gone—and the Bengals won't take a cap hit.

Had the team let Green play out his rookie deal and risked him leaving in the spring, it would have meant a true youth movement—and rebuilding year—for the entire offense.

Mohamed Sanu, Marvin Jones and the rest of the Bengals wideouts are nice complementary pieces, but they certainly don't keep defenses up at night. Even with the running game and offensive line in place, the Bengals would have been all but forced to draft a wideout to start.

In this scenario, a few key defensive cuts could have been made, and the Bengals could have found themselves with plenty of cap space. With the win-now pressure off, the Bengals then wouldn't have been chained to Dalton, either.

After letting Green walk, they could have sent Dalton packing and drafted a new quarterback-receiver combo to build around for 2016 and beyond.

AJ Mast/Associated Press

But by paying to keep Dalton's best weapon in the arsenal, the Bengals keep the current just-good-enough offense together—and leave no room on the roster for a serious challenger to Dalton's job.

Dalton is signed through 2020, whereas Green is signed through 2019. Though it seems like they've been around forever, both are still just 27 years old (Dalton turns 28 in October). They were the nucleus of the last generation of Bengals offense. Now they'll be the nucleus of the next generation, too.

But will Dalton ever be any better than he's been? And will he and Green accomplish enough in the coming seasons to earn their massive combined salaries?

Together with Green, one of the best weapons any quarterback could ask for, Dalton's been just good enough to get the Bengals to the playoffs—but nowhere near good enough to get them to the Promised Land. Without Green, Dalton and the Bengals struggle mightily to keep pace with the high-powered offenses of the AFC.

Unless  A.J. McCarron is the next Kurt Warner, Tom Brady or Colin Kaepernick, though, the Bengals locking up Green's services effectively means they're locking up Dalton, too. Not only will he have another chance to overcome his perennial playoff problems, it may be another four years before the Bengals threaten to break up their Pro Bowl duo.

Unless otherwise noted, contract information courtesy of Spotrac.