Vikings UFA Profile: OLB Danielle Hunter — Will He Be Back in Minnesota?

Will the Vikings sign Hunter to a big multi-year deal or let him walk in free agency?

Author:
Will Ragatz
Publish date:
Feb 26, 2024 2:08 PM EST

In this story:

With the 2023 season in the books, Inside the Vikings is taking a look at all 22 of Minnesota's pending unrestricted free agents over the course of a few weeks. We're examining their past and speculating about their future, particularly the likelihood that they could be re-signed by the Vikings this offseason. We started from the least important (Hakeem Adeniji) and are working our way up to the big fish (Kirk Cousins).

Vikings UFA profile: OLB Danielle Hunter

Age: 29
2023 stats: 17 games, 16.5 sacks, 23 total TFL, 83 tackles, 4 FF, 2 PD
2023 contract AAV: $17 million

If it weren't for Kirk Cousins, Danielle Hunter would clearly be the Vikings' most prominent in-house free agent. He's a top-ten player on the market this spring who just happens to be getting overshadowed a bit by arguably the most valuable UFA in the league. But make no mistake — Hunter will be a major prize for whoever signs him to a multi-year deal this offseason.

Drafted in the third round out of LSU back in 2015 (when he was just 20 years old), Hunter broke out with 14.5 sacks in 2018 and has been among the game's top 5-10 edge rushers ever since, making the Pro Bowl in each of his last four healthy seasons. In 2019, when he put together a second consecutive 14.5-sack season, he became the youngest player in NFL history to reach 50 career sacks, hitting the mark shortly after his 25th birthday.

Then, unfortunately, Hunter's next two seasons — and perhaps his Hall of Fame trajectory — were thrown off course by injuries. He missed all of the 2020 season and most of 2021 due to season-ending upper-body injuries, costing him as many as 25 games in the heart of his prime. Hunter stayed healthy in 2022 and had a solid bounce-back season, then went to another level this past year under Brian Flores. He posted a career-high 16.5 sacks in 2023, tying Maxx Crosby for the NFL lead with 23 total tackles for loss. He also had four forced fumbles and 80 pressures.

Now, after agreeing to a modified one-year, $17 million deal (with another $3 million in sack incentives that he reached) to end a holdout last summer, Hunter hits free agency with the chance to cash in one more big contract while he's still on the back end of his prime. Back in 2018, he signed a five-year, $72 million contract that quickly became very team-friendly and led to contract drama in 2021, '22, and '23. This time, even as Hunter approaches his 30th birthday, he's going to get a lot more than $14.4 million on an annual basis. Think at least $20 million per year, and probably more.

Hunter isn't in the truly elite tier of edge rushers, which includes superstars like T.J. Watt, Myles Garrett, Micah Parsons, Nick Bosa, and Maxx Crosby. He has the four Pro Bowls, but just one second team All-Pro nod to his name. Still, he's not that far behind. Hunter is an athletic freak of nature at 6'5", 263 pounds, and he has a wide variety of moves he can use to get to the quarterback from wherever he lines up. He's also a strong run defender (even if PFF strangely disliked him in that phase this year) who is always relentless in his pursuit of the ball.

Even with the injuries mixed in, Hunter is already sixth in Vikings history with 87.5 career sacks. It would be fun to see him get paid by Minnesota this offseason and continue climbing up that leaderboard, but it's also possible that he ends up getting an offer from another team that the Vikings don't want to match. A three-year deal probably makes sense for Hunter; that would take him through his age-32 season. Whether or not that happens internally is a big domino in the Vikings' offseason, even if it's overshadowed by Cousins and Justin Jefferson speculation. If Hunter ends up elsewhere, his production and consistency won't be easy to replace.

Previous Vikings UFA profiles: