Four Vikings In Line For Big Pay Increases

Because of the amount of playing time they've received in their first three NFL seasons, four members of the Minnesota Vikings' draft class of 2012 are in line for significant pay increases in 2015.

According to Ben Goessling of ESPN.com, cornerback Josh Robinson, wide receiver Jarius Wright, tight end Rhett Ellison, and safety Robert Blanton are going to see bumps in their salary for next year, based on the fact that they've played at least 35% of the team's snaps in two of their first three seasons.

Robinson's base salary was set to be $766,000 next season. According to Goessling, that number will go up to $1,564,000. Wright, Ellison, and Blanton were all set to make $660,000 next season, but their salaries will increase to $1,574,000. The exact amount of the increases comes to a total of $3,531,804. (That's Goessling's figure, anyway.)

Even with those bumps in salary, the Vikings still have a cap figure of about $129 million. If the cap goes up to $140 million, as projected, the Vikings currently sit approximately $11 million under. That number figures to increase a little bit with the team likely (hopefully) to release guard Charlie Johnson and, possibly, linebacker Chad Greenway. At the very least, Greenway is going to be a serious candidate for a restructure. Players like Greg Jennings and, yes, even Adrian Peterson could potentially be targets for some kind of salary alteration as well.

With these four players all being part of the draft class of 2012, it means that 2015 is a contract year for all four of them, meaning that they're going to be playing for an even bigger bump in pay for 2016. Hopefully they'll all produce in 2015 to the point where they get them.