Kevin Minter Agrees to Bengals Contract After 4 Years with Cardinals

The Cincinnati Bengals and free-agent linebacker Kevin Minter have come to terms on a contract for 2017, the team officially announced on Monday morning.

ESPN's Josina Anderson was the first to report Minter was signing with the Bengals on Mar. 18. Ian Rapoport of NFL Network reported Wednesday that the deal is a one-year, $4 million contract with $2.1 million guaranteed.

Minter, 26, spent the last four seasons with the Arizona Cardinals. He recorded 81 tackles and a career-high 3.5 sacks in 2016, starting all 16 games at the inside linebacker spot.

"It was just a lot of learning and growing," Minter said, per Josh Weinfuss of ESPN.com. "Middle linebacker position, you're the quarterback [of the defense], and like any quarterback you got to learn and develop because you pretty much got to know what everybody's doing. You got to know, not only your job, but everybody else's. You got to line everybody up. You got to know all the checks. You got to kind of anticipate what the offense is doing."

Minter has started all 16 games in each of the last two seasons, developing into a solid fixture after mostly serving as a backup in his first and second NFL years. Pro Football Focus ranked Minter 25th among all linebackers in 2016.

"It took me a while to just get stuff down to where I can really be a caller out there, a real leader out there," Minter said. "I'll definitely say it's an upswing. It's a hell of an upswing. Rookie year, my head was swimming, everything was just super fast. And now everything has slowed down. I'm really into this game, so 'upswing' is definitely an understatement."

Still in the prime of his career with relatively little wear and tear on his body, Cincinnati is acquiring Minter at the perfect time. He's coming into his own mentally as a player, he's always been physically talented and the production is starting to back up his former second-round status.

Minter isn't going to draw the same level of attention as Alshon Jeffery or any of the bigger names on the market, but he could go down as one of the best under-the-radar signings.

The Bengals need to have depth at inside linebacker. Vontaze Burfict is a solid playmaker when he's on the field, but injuries and suspensions have made him unreliable at this point in his career. Rey Maualuga has missed 10 games over the past four seasons.

After injuries wreaked havoc on the Bengals in 2016, they can't afford to play things safe if they want to challenge the Pittsburgh Steelers for the AFC North title and make a return trip to the playoffs.