The Minnesota Vikings defensive end is severely underpaid.
Back in 2017, the Minnesota Vikings decided to transition Danielle Hunter into one of their starting defensive ends. In his first two seasons with the Vikings, Hunter had displayed that he was ready for a bigger role and the team felt it couldn’t wait any longer to put him in the starting lineup.
Even though his first year as a starter ended with him only accumulating a total of seven sacks, Minnesota still had plenty of confidence in their young pass rusher. So much so that the Vikings gave Hunter a five-year, $72 million extension during the 2018 offseason.
Since signing his extension, all the talented defensive end has done is rack up a total of 29 sacks in his last two years with Minnesota.
The Minnesota Vikings pass rusher is beyond a bargain
On Tuesday, it was revealed that the Los Angeles Chargers and defensive end Joey Bosa have agreed to a five-year, $135 million extension. With his new deal, Bosa’s average salary will now jump all the way up to $27 million per season from 2021 to 2026.
On his current contract, Hunter’s average yearly salary is $14.4 million. That is now almost twice as less than what Bosa is going to make per season on his new deal.
Hunter’s average salary is actually only the 22nd-highest among defensive linemen in the NFL right now and given how productive he’s been during the last two years, that’s a little mind-boggling.
Even just looking at the numbers he has put up compared to Bosa since 2016, Hunter has accumulated 8.5 more sacks (48.5) than the Chargers pass rusher (40) in the last four seasons.
That’s not it. Of the 21 defensive linemen who have an average salary higher than Hunter this year, he has racked up more sacks than 19 of them since 2016. Only Chandler Jones and Aaron Donald have brought down the opposing quarterback more often than the Vikings pass rusher during the last four seasons.
With Hunter’s current contract not set to expire until 2024, he probably won’t be getting a new deal anytime soon. By the time he is ready for another extension from Minnesota though, there’s a good chance that contract will be among the highest-ever given out to a player in the history of the franchise.