Hunter Renfrow is trying to take advantage of a second chance at football. After missing the entire 2024 season due to an ulcerative colitis diagnosis, Renfrow is healthy and making quite the impression at Carolina Panthers training camp. Though Renfrow will be fighting to make the 53-man roster, he has already gotten the attention of coach Dave Canales.
“It’s a great story that’s unfolding right in front of our eyes,” Canales said of Renfrow’s comeback.
Canales said Renfrow looks much more like the shifty slot receiver everyone saw in the first few years of his career with the Raiders.
“It’s just the Hunter Renfrow I remember,” Canales said. “He looks healthy. I think everyone who has watched football over the last four or five years remembers what he looks like. He’s really playing at top form right now. I’m excited to have him here right now.”
Through the early stages of training camp, Renfrow has flashed his ability to separate from his defender off the line of scrimmage. In one clip, Renfrow threw his defender out of frame with surgical route-running.
In another, Renfrow dove to make a fingertip catch on a poorly thrown ball by backup quarterback Andy Dalton.
A fifth-round pick by the then Oakland Raiders in 2019, Renfrow’s career got off to a promising start. He was a reliable slot receiver in his first two years but took a big leap forward in 2021. That season, Renfrow hauled in 103 of his 128 targets for 1,038 yards and nine touchdowns.
It looked like Renfrow had established himself at the NFL level, but he dealt with concussion issues in 2022, and the ulcerative colitis really took its toll on him in 2023. Renfrow lost almost 19% of his 185-pound playing weight while dealing with fatigue and high fevers.
“It kicked my butt pretty good,” Renfrow told the Panthers’ website in April. “Last year, I fluctuated in weight; I went down to 150 pounds. I had like seven straight days of 103-degree fevers. It’s tough to play when you’re not feeling great.”
That led to Renfrow missing the entire 2024 season while he got the disease under control. Once he did, the Panthers came calling, and he signed a one-year deal last spring.
Whether Renfrow can carry this momentum into the preseason and crack the final roster remains to be seen. What is certain is that Renfrow looks much healthier than the last time we saw him in 2023, and people in Carolina are starting to take notice.
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Author: Austin Nivison
July 28, 2025 | 12:26 pm
