Just one day following Paul LaPolice’s signing in Ottawa, the team makes a move on former NFL and AAF running back Akeem Hunt

Yesterday, the Ottawa Redblacks and Paul LaPolice were full of smiles after announcing a three year deal they had agreed on. They might have had a celebration at yesterdays press conference, but it didn’t stop them from getting to work toay.

Following yesterday’s announcement, Marcel Desjardins and the Redblacks front office agreed to sign Akeem Hunt.

In his career, Hunt has experienced a lot of football. Coming out of high school, he was a top running back in the country and later landed at Purdue University. With the Boilermakers, he played all four seasons putting up great numbers.

In Purdue, he was mostly used as a backup for the first two seasons as he totaled for just 96 touches where he turned in 1,870 all-purpose yards and 7 touchdowns. With him averaging 19.4 all-purpose yards per touch in the first two seasons he was granted a flex position in the Boilermaker offense to finish his college career.

With the new role in Purdue’s offense, he had 314 more touches than the previous two seasons and he brought in 2,753 all-purpose yards and 13 touchdowns in his final two seasons.

The great improvement in the final two seasons helped him on scouting boards as he was given a contract from the New York Giants which gave him the opportunity to show what he had to offer. Unfortunately for Hunt, this opportunity wasn’t good enough and neither was the next stint with the Baltimore Ravens.

After being cut by both the Giants and Ravens early on in the 2015 season, he was granted a contract which would last. On November 2nd, he was signed by the Houston Texans and just 20 days later he suited up for his first NFL game. He only got 4 yards off two carries in game one, but with 7 total games in 2015 he ran and received for over 135 yards.

The 2015 season fell short due to the Texans getting back their starting backs for their playoff run, but that didn’t stop him from coming back to the Texans in 2016. To start off 2016, Akeem Hunt ran over all defenders in pre-season running for 122 total yards and leading the team with 3 touchdowns. In 2016, the Houston Texans got Lamar Millar, who took away snaps from Hunt, although he was still fortunate to play 8 games, running the ball 20 times for 109 yards along with catching it 3 times for 29 yards.

Hunt had his best year yet with the Texans in 2016, although the free agency period came by and took him away from the team he knew best.In 2017, Hunt played with the Kansas City Chiefs where he’d play a big role on their special teams along with being a running back if they needed one.

With the Chiefs already having Kareem Hunt, and Charcandrick West they weren’t in need of Akeem Hunt on the offense as he got just 12 touches in the 15 games he dressed. Although he had just 12 touches for 54 yards in the 2017 season, his 15 games on special teams led to a total of 5 defensive/special team tackles.

After the 2017 season, the Chiefs were in good hands with the running backs group they had therefore they let go of Hunt going into the 2018 season.

Although he wasn’t given a contract from an NFL team, Hunt didn’t leave football quite yet, he ended up signing a contract with the AAF’s Orlando Apollos where he’d be their 3rd string running back behind both D’Ernest Johnson and De’Veon Smith. In Orlando, Hunt played all 8 games of the AAF’s existence and tallied up 234 all-purpose yards and 2 touchdowns.

As we all know, the AAF later folded in Feburary of 2019 and this suspension of operations left Akeem Hunt without a contract for the 2019 season. Unfortunately, without the AAF, he was also unable to land a job back in the NFL. He sat out all of 2019,but he was still on the Redblacks negotiations list, and after the 2019 CFL season and the announcement of Paul LaPolice as the coach it was announced that the Redblacks would have Akeem Hunt on their roster going into 2020.

Welcome to Ottawa Akeem Hunt!