Jordan Raanan of ESPN mentioned that he heard over the past week or so that there is a team in the mix for free agent DT Johnathan Hankins other than the Giants.
Although, Raanan added that he isn’t sure what to make of this.
The Dolphins previously came up as a potential landing spot for Hankins, but it’s unlikely they would be willing to offer much in terms of salary. The Colts were also interested in Dontari Poe before he signed with the Falcons.
Last we heard regarding Hankins, Kimberly Jones reported that the Giants’ multi-year offer that’s in line with the free agent market contracts signed this offseason was still on the table for Hankins.
Giants owner John Mara also mentioned that there hasn’t been “any real movement” towards an agreement with Hankins.
“I don’t think there’s been any real movement there,” Mara said, via Dan Duggan of NJ.com. “We still very much like him on our team. He’s a good player, really good kid. He adds a lot to our team. Hopefully we’ll get it worked out. But I have no idea whether that will happen or not.”
New York has shown interest in retaining Hankins and the market clearly has not played out as he had hoped. Another positive development for the Giants is the fact that they recently picked up a good amount of cap space by locking up DE Jason Pierre-Paul to a long-term contract.
At this point, a return to the Giants on a one-year contract could make the most sense for Hankins, as it would give him another opportunity to be part of a potentially dominant defensive front before hitting the open market again in 2018.
Poe and Bennie Logan both agreed to one-year deals at lower salaries, so it would be tough for a team to justify paying Hankins this much money based on how things have played out over the past few weeks.
Hankins, 24, is a former second-round pick of the Giants back in 2013. He played out the final year of his four-year, $4.03 million rookie contract that included a $1.311 million signing bonus and is now testing the open market as an unrestricted free agent for the first time in his career.
In 2016, Hankins appeared in all 16 games and recorded 44 tackles, three sacks and a forced fumble for the Giants. Pro Football Focus has him rated as the No. 72 interior defender out of 127 qualifying players.
We have him featured in our Top 50 Available Free Agents list.
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