Nik Bonitto picked a good time to deliver a breakout season. The edge rusher market is amid an offseason surge, after a bit of a lull (Nick Bosa‘s contract excluded) in recent years. More deals topping $40MM per year should emerge once T.J. Watt, Micah Parsons and Aidan Hutchinson are extended. Hutchinson is not a lock to be paid this year, but the Lions dynamo’s trajectory places him as a clear candidate to be paid the new going rate for All-Pro-caliber edge rushers.
Becoming a second-team All-Pro in 2024, Bonitto may not be aiming as high. But it will still cost the Broncos to keep him on a second contract, as the team will seek to do. The former 2022 second-round pick is eyeing a deal at least north of the $20MM-per-year barrier, the Denver Gazette’s Chris Tomasson notes. Bonitto, 25, has said he wants to stay in Denver long term, Tomasson adds. The sides have begun extension talks.
[RELATED: Assessing Bonitto’s Extension Candidacy]
For the Broncos to have Bonitto extension talks start near $20MM AAV would probably be a win for the team, which saw its top edge rusher zoom to a 13.5-sack season that featured defensive touchdowns in back-to-back games. Bonitto, however, displayed difference-making potential in 2023 as well. His 2024 season included only four more QB hits (24) than he racked up in 2023. The Oklahoma product also tallied only three more tackles for loss (16-13) compared to 2023, when he only started four games.
Denver made a key decision about its EDGE future by trading Baron Browning and extending his former Ohio State teammate, Jonathon Cooper, before last year’s deadline. Cooper is signed to a team-friendly accord — four years, $54MM. It will cost far more to extend Bonitto, whose age and early-career production would give him a case to check in much higher than $20MM per year. Another impact season would crystalize that value and likely drive up the price, especially should Watt, Parsons and Hutchinson make $40MM-AAV deals a true salary bracket rather than a Myles Garrett-only zone. Twelve edge rushers are tied to deals worth at least $20MM per year now.
The Broncos carried a top-market OLB salary on their books for five-plus seasons, after having paid Von Miller before the 2016 franchise tag deadline. Denver used the pick the Rams sent over for Miller (No. 64 overall) on Bonitto and then passed on paying Bradley Chubb, trading him in 2022. Thanks to recent salary cap spikes, Bonitto will almost definitely land a higher AAV than Miller’s Broncos or Bills deals produced. When Denver extended Miller at $19.1MM per year nine summers ago, the cap stood at $155.3MM. It is now $279.2MM, creating a landscape in which a $40MM-per-year deal for a top-tier pass rusher can happen. Bonitto can make a case to secure a second-tier EDGE pact.
Bonitto may be the Broncos’ top extension candidate, in terms of earning potential, but the team has both Zach Allen and Courtland Sutton on the re-up radar this year. Sutton talks have begun, while Allen has expressed interest in staying beyond his 2025 contract year. Both players are tied to $15MM-per-year deals, and each has outplayed them. Allen having joined Bonitto as a second-team All-Pro last season offers a complication for the Broncos, who paid Patrick Surtain a then-market-setting rate at cornerback and gave eight-figure AAVs to D.J. Jones, Talanoa Hufanga and Dre Greenlaw in March.
The Broncos were able lock in Surtain at a favorable rate ($24MM) on a deal that runs through 2029, but if they run into a value gap with Bonitto, a 2026 franchise tag would stand to be in play. While Allen and Sutton money will need to be factored in — if/once extensions are hammered out — the team is projected to hold $69MM-plus in cap space next year. It will carry more flexibility in 2026, as the Russell Wilson dead money will be off the books. Bo Nix must stay on a rookie contract through at least the 2026 season. Though, Nix’s progress — re: a potential 2027 payday — will become a factor as the Broncos consider long-term deals this offseason.
20mm, sign him immediately
They definitely need to pay him before he demands way more than $20 million per.
The old school brain says that this is wayyy too much money, but the way that extensions are going now, it will probably end up being a bargain in two years’ time.
Denver would still be paying for potential, though. Bonitto had a breakthrough year by average players’ standards, but Denver’s pass rush is a platoon sort of affair at the moment. Bonitto is a great addition to that, but is he a lead pass rusher? Is he more essential than Cooper? Denver has added edge rushers consistently since Bonitto was drafted. I don’t know if they were just doing that to keep a strong stable, or if they were preparing to lose someone, but it seems that Bonitto still needs to prove that he can consistently produce at a lead level to earn that contract. If Denver believes that he can, they need to sign him sooner rather than later.
BOOMER SOONER!