Patriots Should Feel Optimistic About Bengals Exec’s Tee Higgins Comments

The Patriots will enter the offseason with the most cap space out of any NFL team, and there’s one prized free agent fans hope they go after.

Multiple team leaders began the campaign to get Tee Higgins to sign with New England. The 26-year-old is seeking a new contract, and a bad sign for Mike Vrabel’s side is that Higgins seems intent on staying with the Cincinnati Bengals.

That sentiment was mutual when director of player personnel Duke Tobin spoke at the 2025 Senior Bowl on Wednesday.

“I’ve always been very upfront in my desire to have Tee Higgins on our team,” Tobin told reporters, per Pro Football Talk. “I’ve never not been upfront about that, and that desire continues, but we have to be able to come together with his representation on what that means and what the right number is for his experience, for his play time, for his production. … Let’s find something that works for everybody, because he is a guy that we want to have here, and hopefully that can come together, but we have other guys who are trying to take big bites of the apple in other areas, and we’re going to have to balance those as we go forward.”

The Bengals also want to re-sign Ja’Marr Chase and Trey Hendrickson, so it could make Higgins the odd man out. Tobin acknowledged that the Bengals would need to make deals “that make sense for everybody.”

That should give the Patriots some hope that Higgins is indeed the odd man out and would be available on the open market. It’s not unrealistic for the Bengals to re-sign all their stars, but history suggests at least one of them could be available in free agency.