The Carolina Panthers are signing former Arizona Cardinals outside linebacker Haason Reddick to a one-year deal, per a league source. The deal is worth $6 million guaranteed, with a max of $8 million, per NFL Network.
Reddick played for Panthers head coach Matt Rhule during his time as a coach at Temple. The linebacker has spent the last four years in Arizona after being selected 13th overall in the 2017 NFL draft.
Coming off of his best career season by far, Reddick had 12.5 sacks in 2020, tied for fourth-most, and six forced fumbles. He has also had three straight season of 60-plus sacks and has played all 16 games of a season in every year of his career. However, during his first three seasons with Carolina, Reddick only combined for 7.5 sacks.
Reddick played for Rhule and his staff at Temple from 2012-16. He was originally a walk-on, and considered leaving the program, per a VICE story from 2017, but re-joined when Rhule was hired as head coach in December 2017. He emerged in his junior season in 2015, becoming a star defensive end and one of the best players in the conference, which led him to being picked in the first-round of the draft.
Prior to Reddick being drafted, Rhule spoke to Sports Illustrated about how proud he was of the journey he had been on.
“ I’m unbelievably proud of (Reedick), and the fact that he invited me (to the NFL draft) was one of the things I’ve cherished most along the way,” Rhule told SI. “I’m really proud of him because no one gave him anything. Even the past year going into this process, he’s a down the line guy, and all he’s done is work and work and work. Once he started to have a ton of success, he didn’t change. He kept running down on the kickoff team even when he knew he was going to get drafted really high because he wanted to win. He’s every bit the example of our program and what we want it to be like.”
The Panthers were missing a dominant presence to play opposite edge rusher Brian Burns, and Reddick provides the team with that. Last year, Burns led the team with nine sacks, and the next closest player was free agent Efe Obada with 5.5.
