Bengals Figure Chris Henry Has Changed His Life In Past, Oh, Four Months

Let me go ahead and say this for you: "Chris Henry is a great talent. The Bengals can get him cheap. The Bengals need help at the receiver spot. I don't care what he does off the field as long as he brings in on Sundays"

Is that it? Good.

Every NFL team had the same shot as the talented, cheap, helpful Chris Henry ... and none wanted any part of him. The other 31 teams haven't felt abandoned by Henry, who takes some NFL-sanctioned time off here and there. None of the other teams have invested anything in Henry ... so bringing him in on the cheap wouldn't harm them. Low risk, high reward.

But the Bengals drafted Henry, have relied on Henry and have had to deal with his suspensions in his three professional seasons (by the way ... he is suspended for the first four games of this season, too). He has been a bad member of the community and you are welcoming him back.

It makes no sense to me. Oh, sure, the part that the Bengals badly need at receiver and Henry was pretty cheap makes sense. But the Bengals didn't cut him in April because he was a bad player; they cut him because he was a bad person.

"But those charges were dropped, so it's all good". No, it's not. Just because charges were dropped doesn't mean nothing happened. There has been nothing in the time he's been here ... including the four months he's been employed ... that shows he's matured. He's had his cars and house taken away from him, he's broke from lawyer fees and lack of financial planning and he's one dumb move from getting the hook from the NFL.

Cincinnati radio host and blogger Mo Egger said it best:

What does it say when every other NFL team, most of whom have far better track records than you regarding personnel, decided they didn't need Chris Henry?

If the Bengals went out and gave Chris Perry a nice cushy deal, or gave Tab Perry a big contract, or laid some dough on a guy who was another IR mainstay, we'd beat them up for investing in an injury-prone guy. Well I'll take injury prone over arrest prone any day. Why do we not get upset about that?

This is a guy that a local judge called "a one man crime wave". A man that wore his own jersey as he waved guns at people. A guy that owner Mike Brown said this about just one month ago: "We don't want that kind of behavior. We're trying to be more concientous of guys we bring in. We're trying to go forward with guys who are relaible and guys who are not only good players, but good citizens."