Danielle Hunter wins NFC Defensive Player of the Week Award

With 3.5 sacks and the game-sealing touchdown, the Minnesota Vikings defensive end added another accolade to a breakout season.

Last Sunday, the Minnesota Vikings put on a clinic in the trenches against the Detroit Lions. The defensive line terrorized Matthew Stafford all afternoon long and with ten sacks and Minnesota was able to pick up a crucial 24-9 victory inside their division.

While everybody got these sacks for the Vikings, the one player that stood out was defensive end Danielle Hunter. The emerging star played the role of lion tamer against Detroit, racking up 3.5 sacks and provided the game-clinching scoop and score off a failed option pitch from Stafford to an unsuspecting Kerryon Johnson midway through the fourth quarter, earning him the title of NFC Defensive Player of the Week for Week 9.

The accolade is another exclamation point on what is becoming a true breakout season for the fourth-year pro. After the Detroit victory, Hunter leads the NFL with 11.5 sacks and is becoming an all-around force that can also get involved in stopping the run as demonstrated by nine total tackles on Sunday afternoon.

The staggering part about Hunter’s breakout season is that he just turned 24 last week. The combination of emerging talent and youth already make the five-year, $72 million contract extension Hunter signed during last offseason look like a steal. It’s not bad for the initial cost on Hunter as a third-round pick in the 2014 NFL Draft out of LSU.

If Hunter keeps playing like this, he’ll join the likes of his fellow Pro Bowl teammates Everson Griffen, Linval Joseph, and Sheldon Richardson by the end of the season. That gives Minnesota one of the most intimidating defensive fronts in the league that could play a key role in the final stretch which begins with a matchup with the Chicago Bears on November 18.