Player
Andrew Van Ginkel
LB · Vikings
Andrew Van Ginkel: facts drawn from the play-by-play.
Five years of rotational MIA snaps — then he signed with Minnesota and put up 12 sacks at age 28.
TrendVan Ginkel career production by year
| Year | Team | Sacks | QB Hits | TFL | Tackles | PD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | MIA | 1 | 4 | 4 | 11 | 0 |
| 2020 | MIA | 5 | 10 | 7 | 26 | 4 |
| 2021 | MIA | 3 | 20 | 9 | 40 | 7 |
| 2022 | MIA | 0 | 4 | 3 | 22 | 2 |
| 2023 | MIA | 5 | 19 | 8 | 31 | 8 |
| 2024 | MIN | 12 | 20 | 19 | 42 | 6 |
| 2025 | MIN | 6 | 13 | 11 | 25 | 10 |
Sacks per season
| Season | Sacks |
|---|---|
| MIA | 1 |
| MIA | 5 |
| MIA | 3 |
| MIA | 0 |
| MIA | 5 |
| MIN | 12 |
| MIN | 6 |
Across five Miami seasons (2019-2023), his single-year peak was 5 sacks — he was a special-teams-plus-rotational-EDGE for half a decade. Then he signed with Brian Flores in Minnesota and immediately doubled his career best: 12 sacks, 19 TFLs, 42 tackles in 2024.
The age-28 breakout is the kind of late-career arc that almost never happens at this position — most pass rushers either flash by 25 or never do.
Brian Flores's defense unlocked him — his Minnesota sack rate is 4x his Miami rate.
SplitAVG career production split by team
| Stop | Years | Sacks | Sacks/Year | PD/Year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MIA | 5 (2019-23) | 14 | 2.8 | 4.2 |
| MIN | 2 (2024-25) | 18 | 9.0 | 8.0 |
In Miami he averaged 2.8 sacks per year. In Minnesota he's averaging 9.0 — a more-than-3x jump on a player who hadn't changed physically. Pass deflections nearly doubled too (4.2 → 8.0/yr).
Flores's blitz-everyone scheme is a famously good fit for *exactly* this archetype — a smart, versatile EDGE/LB hybrid who can drop into coverage one snap and rush off the edge the next. Van Ginkel is the poster child for it.
He's a top-10 pass-rushing LB *and* leads his position group in pass deflections.
RareNFL LB-position sack leaders, 2024-25 combined
| Player | Sacks | Pass Deflections |
|---|---|---|
| Nik Bonitto | 25 | 5 |
| Brian Burns | 24 | 3 |
| Micah Parsons | 22 | 3 |
| Josh Sweat | 22 | 4 |
| Tuli Tuipulotu | 21 | 5 |
| Odafe Oweh | 20 | 5 |
| Byron Young | 19 | 4 |
| Andrew Van Ginkel | 18 | 16 |
16 pass deflections across 2024-25 — more than triple anyone else on this list, and the most by any LB-position pass rusher in the NFL.
The other top-10 sack producers at his position are pure rushers (Bonitto: 5 PDs, Parsons: 3 PDs). Van Ginkel is doing both because Flores rotates him through coverage assignments. 18 sacks plus 16 PDs is a profile that doesn't really exist anywhere else in the league.
At age 30 (in 2025) he's one of only 3 LBs over 28 with double-digit-sack credentials in the league.
ComparisonLate-career LB pass-rush context (2024-25 sacks)
| Player | Approx Age in 2025 | 24-25 Sacks |
|---|---|---|
| T.J. Watt (LB) | 31 | — |
| Andrew Van Ginkel | 30 | 18 |
| Brian Burns (LB) | 27 | 24 |
| Josh Sweat (LB) | 28 | 22 |
Most edge-rushing LBs peak between 24-27. Van Ginkel didn't hit double-digit sacks in a season until age 28, and his 18 over the last two years as a 29-30 year-old puts him in a tiny tier of late-bloomers.
For context: he played his first 60+ NFL games as a special-teamer-plus-rotational guy. Most players with that profile don't get a second act — he got one and immediately became an All-Pro-caliber piece of the Vikings' defense.
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