Bengals may be making a major mistake at the NFL League Meeting and they only have themselves to blame

Cincinnati Bengals fans usually get to hear from Katie Blackburn, the club's executive vice president, once a year from the NFL Annual League Meeting.

That isn't the case this year.

The Athletic's Paul Dehner Jr. reports Blackburn will not be available for questions this week at the League Meeting in Phoenix, AZ.

"Normally we would be speaking with Katie Blackburn out there, and this would be that time. That's not going to happen this year," Dehner said on The Growler podcast. "The Bengals are no making her available out there, so I will not have that to react to."

Katie Blackburn's voice, or lack thereof, matters

Blackburn is not the listed "owner" of the Bengals. That designation still belongs to her father, Mike Brown, who inherited the club from his father and franchise founder, Paul Brown. That said, Blackburn is the most important executive within the front office on a day-to-day basis. She is the central figurehead of Cincinnati's operations, and any major financial decision, especially significant player contracts, are finalized by her.

How the Bengals navigate through an offseason is ultimately dependent on her as she's the chief contract negotiator for the team. Free agency runs through her willingness to get deals done, and by the structure of the contracts.

Bryan Cook, Boye Mafe, and Jonathan Allen were Cincy's notable free agent acquisitions this month. The three signings are accounting for $37,416,666 in salary cap dollars this year alone, an abnormally large Year One sum for just three signings. Joe Flacco's one-year deal is going to account for another $6 million, and the Bengals are now left with the amount of space they usually have when they're done making significant moves.

Cincinnati did all this and still left certain roster holes open. Blackburn explaining how that process came to be is important for media and fans alike, and being unavailable for comment would be an unforced error.

The Bengals believe in their process, and if they stand on it, then they shouldn't have issue talking about it. It doesn't have to be from Blackburn, but she is the proper representative of the franchise as her decision-making power trumps everyone else's. Director of player personnel Duke Tobin can say what he believes when he gets chances to speak to media members, but the Brown family determines how much the club can accomplish.

Fans need that transparency in order to have the clearest perspective on what the team is doing, where it is headed, and if continuing to follow is the right move. Not speaking at all is a choice the Bengals and Blackburn are apparently making, and it doesn't look like a good one on the surface.