Swayze Bozeman keeps forcing his way into the Bengals conversation.
Cincinnati’s linebacker room still looks like one of the shakier spots on the roster, but Bozeman has become an unexpected reason for optimism. He followed up a strong start to camp with three tackles, a tackle for loss, and a pass deflection in Thursday’s 16-14 preseason win over the Detroit Lions.
That matters because the names in front of him don’t leave much room for comfort. Barrett Carter and Demetrius Knight Jr. are being talked up as second-year jump candidates, but the depth behind them has been thin. Even if those two improve, they were two of the worst linebackers in the league in 2025, so Cincinnati still needs help to emerge from somewhere.
Bozeman’s route into that picture has opened fast. When the Bengals first released a depth chart this season, he was easy to overlook. At the time, he was viewed as a third-stringer behind Joe Giles-Harris, and that seemed like the end of the discussion.
Instead, he’s kept climbing.
In the preseason opener, Bozeman spent most of his snaps working as the MIKE and green dot alongside Oren Burks with the second-team defense. He handled that role well, and the most notable play came when he blitzed and stopped a run for a 4-yard loss.
There’s a reason some attention was on him before camp even got rolling. Coming out of Southern Miss in 2024, Bozeman posted a 9.69 Relative Athletic Score despite weighing in at the 20th percentile. That kind of raw athleticism is hard to ignore, even if the number alone doesn’t guarantee anything.
The Bengals have already seen how that can go. Jack Dingle, the undrafted rookie linebacker and former Cincinnati Bearcat who was once viewed as a sleeper, sits at the bottom of the MIKE linebacker depth chart.
Bozeman, meanwhile, has a clearer lane. Giles-Harris has already carved out a role as a special teams standout, with Bengals.com senior writer Geoff Hobson naming him co-special teams player of the year in 2025.
Behind Carter and Knight, there just isn’t much else making a strong case. That leaves Bozeman with a real shot at the 53-man roster.
His background also makes the whole thing a little more interesting. Like Dingle, Bozeman entered the league as an undrafted athletic project. He started his NFL path in Kansas City, then had stints with the Bears and Giants before Cincinnati claimed him off waivers in May.
It’s not hard to imagine that his familiarity with some of Cincinnati’s newer faces helped. Bryan Cook arrived from the Chiefs in free agency, and Dexter Lawrence came over from the Giants in a trade, so it’s at least possible one or both had a hand in Bozeman landing with the Bengals.
Either way, someone in Duke Tobin’s scouting group clearly liked what they saw enough to bring him in for a look. Right now, that move is paying off.
Bozeman is in a Bengals uniform, and the linebacker group looks better than expected because of it. The next test comes soon enough, with Cincinnati set to face the Chicago Bears in joint practices and again in Week 2 of the preseason.
In Other News...
Bengals Passed On One EDGE And The Debate Just Got Louder
The 2025 draft has already become a talking point for Cincinnati because of the different paths taken by two edge rushers who were on the board at the same time. Atlanta went with James Pearce Jr., while the Bengals chose Shemar Stewart, and the comparison has only sharpened as both franchises wait for those decisions to play out on the field. For Cincinnati, the appeal was obvious at the time: a young defender with big traits who could grow into a long-term piece up front.
The problem is that the early returns have not brought much clarity. Stewart has not yet matched the kind of impact the Bengals were hoping for, and his current injury only adds another layer to a pick that is still being judged. Pearce, meanwhile, is now creating a different kind of headache for Atlanta, which is why the debate over which team handled the draft slot better is only getting louder. [Read more 🡒]
Bengals Depth Battle Already Produced Some Early Standouts
The Bengals preseason opener against the Lions was less about the headline names and more about the players trying to force their way into the conversation. With Joe Burrow and other starters seeing limited work, Cincinnati leaned on a mix of new defensive additions and young depth pieces in a 16-14 win that offered an early look at how the back end of the roster might begin to take shape.
Dexter Lawrence and Jonathan Allen drew plenty of attention as part of the defenses new look, but the more immediate intrigue came from the turnover swings and timely snaps made by players battling for jobs. In August, those are the kinds of moments that matter most, and the Bengals already have a few standouts making the case that this competition could get interesting well before cutdown day. [Read more 🡒]