Danielle Hunter Meets Alan Page, Learns Something Cool

At the age of just 22 years old, Minnesota Vikings’ defensive end Danielle Hunter presumably has a lot of years ahead of him, hopefully continuing to be clad in purple and gold. On Thursday, at the team’s annual playground build, he got to meet the man that might be the greatest Viking of all time. . .at least, that’s what we decided. . .and it turns out that he set a record that it will be very hard for anyone to take away from him.

Hunter got the opportunity to meet Vikings’ legend Alan Page at the playground build, according to Andrew Krammer of the Star-Tribune. During the meet-up, it came out that Hunter, who led the Vikings with 12.5 sacks in 2016, became the youngest player in team history to lead the team in sacks, breaking the record held by. . .Alan Page.

Hunter didn’t beat Page by much. Hunter was 22 years, 2 months old at the end of last season, two months younger than Page was when he led the Vikings in sacks in 1967. Still, knocking an all-time great out of the record books was humbling for Hunter.

“Kind of shocked by it, but at the same time kind of humbled,” Hunter said. “I just knew he was a great pass rusher, got inducted into the Hall of Fame. I guess that’s a good thing if you’re able to beat somebody’s record like that.”

And how did he react when he learned he set the record? According to Krammer, he apologized to Page.

Page does still have the edge on Hunter for sacks over their first two seasons. Page had 19.5 sacks in his first two seasons as a Viking, while Hunter racked up 18.5.

Congratulations to Hunter on his record, and here’s hoping that it’s a precursor to the sort of season he’s going to have in 2017.