Player
Myles Garrett
DL · LA Rams
Sack records move slowly because they require a player to be both dominant and available for a full season, and the 22.5 mark had stood since 2001 with only one player ever matching it. Beating it by half a sack while also posting the second-best tackle-for-loss season on record separates this from a hot streak: he was wrecking run plays and pass plays at the same time.
The 23-sack season
23.0 sacks. The mark Michael Strahan and T.J. Watt shared for a quarter century is no longer shared, and no longer theirs.
MilestoneMost sacks in a regular season, 1999-2025
| Player | Season | Sacks |
|---|---|---|
| Myles Garrett | 2025 | 23.0 |
| Michael Strahan | 2001 | 22.5 |
| T.J. Watt | 2021 | 22.5 |
| Jared Allen | 2011 | 22.0 |
| Justin Houston | 2014 | 22.0 |
| J.J. Watt | 2012 | 20.5 |
| Aaron Donald | 2018 | 20.5 |
| DeMarcus Ware | 2008 | 20.0 |
The rest of the 2025 disruption line
| Measure | Garrett | Runner-up | Where it ranks since 1999 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sacks | 23.0 | Brian Burns, 16.5 | 1st |
| Tackles for loss | 33 | Maxx Crosby, 28 | 2nd, behind J.J. Watt's 39 |
| QB hits | 39 | Zach Allen, 47 | 2nd in 2025 |
He did not edge past the record, he cleared the field. 23.0 sacks, 6.5 more than the next man in the league, plus 33 tackles for loss, the second-highest count in our records behind only J.J. Watt's 2012. The one column he did not lead was quarterback hits, and that comparison is its own story: Denver's Zach Allen made contact with the passer 47 times and finished 7.0 sacks. Garrett made contact 39 times and finished 23.0.
Why it matters. Sack records move slowly because they require a player to be both dominant and available for a full season, and the 22.5 mark had stood since 2001 with only one player ever matching it. Beating it by half a sack while also posting the second-best tackle-for-loss season on record separates this from a hot streak: he was wrecking run plays and pass plays at the same time.
Fourteen of the 23 came in four games. In four others he did not get to the quarterback at all.
AnomalyMyles Garrett 2025, sacks by game
| Week | Opponent | Sacks |
|---|---|---|
| 8 | NE | 5.0 |
| 11 | BAL | 4.0 |
| 12 | LV | 3.0 |
| 1 | CIN | 2.0 |
| The other 13 games | 9.0 combined |
Single-game sack totals of 4.5 or more, 1999-2025
| Player | Season | Sacks |
|---|---|---|
| Khalil Mack | 2023 | 6.0 |
| Adrian Clayborn | 2017 | 6.0 |
| Osi Umenyiora | 2007 | 6.0 |
| Aldon Smith | 2012 | 5.5 |
| Myles Garrett | 2025 | 5.0 |
| Myles Garrett | 2021 | 4.5 |
The record was not a metronome. Four games produced 14.0 of the 23.0 sacks, including a five-sack afternoon against New England in week 8, and four games produced none at all (weeks 4, 5, 6 and 17). Only sixteen games since 1999 have seen a single player reach 4.5 sacks, and Garrett owns two of them. Take the four biggest games out and the rest of his season is a perfectly ordinary 9.0.
Why it matters. Sacks arrive in clumps because they depend on things a pass rusher does not control week to week: how long the quarterback holds it, whether the offense chips him, whether the game script forces dropbacks. A record built on four detonations is still a record, but it is a reminder that the number describes a season of opportunities as much as a level of play, which is exactly why season sack totals swing so hard from one year to the next.
Nine years, 125.5 sacks
125.5 sacks in nine seasons. No player who entered the league this century has had more at the same point.
MilestoneMost sacks through a player's first nine seasons, debuts from 2000 on
| Player | Debut | Sacks in 9 seasons |
|---|---|---|
| Myles Garrett | 2017 | 125.5 |
| DeMarcus Ware | 2005 | 117.5 |
| Jared Allen | 2004 | 117.0 |
| T.J. Watt | 2017 | 115.0 |
| Von Miller | 2011 | 106.0 |
| Aaron Donald | 2014 | 103.0 |
Career sack leaders since 1999, and what it cost them in seasons
| Player | Sacks | Seasons |
|---|---|---|
| Julius Peppers | 159.0 | 17 |
| DeMarcus Ware | 139.0 | 12 |
| Von Miller | 138.5 | 13 |
| Terrell Suggs | 138.0 | 16 |
| Jared Allen | 136.0 | 12 |
| John Abraham | 134.0 | 14 |
| Cameron Jordan | 132.0 | 15 |
| Myles Garrett | 125.5 | 9 |
He is already eighth on the career list, and every man above him needed at least twelve seasons to get there. Garrett has done it in nine, 8.0 clear of DeMarcus Ware's pace and ahead of T.J. Watt, who entered the league in the same draft. Eleven more sacks passes Jared Allen. Thirty-four passes Julius Peppers for the top of the era.
Why it matters. Career sack totals reward longevity more than peak, which is why the all-time list is full of players who lasted sixteen years rather than players who ever led the league. Garrett is climbing it on rate instead, and he opens the 2026 season at 30. That combination is what separates a great player from a player who ends up at the top of the list.
Eight straight seasons of double-digit sacks. Jared Allen and DeMarcus Ware topped out at seven.
RareLongest streaks of consecutive 10-sack seasons, 1999-2025
| Player | Streak | Span |
|---|---|---|
| Myles Garrett | 8 | 2018 to 2025 |
| Jared Allen | 7 | 2007 to 2013 |
| DeMarcus Ware | 7 | 2006 to 2012 |
| Simeon Rice | 5 | 2001 to 2005 |
| Aaron Donald | 5 | 2017 to 2021 |
| Micah Parsons | 5 | 2021 to 2025 |
The quieter streak: forced fumbles, every season of his career
| Season | Sacks | Forced fumbles |
|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 7.0 | 1 |
| 2019 | 10.0 | 2 |
| 2020 | 12.0 | 4 |
| 2023 | 14.0 | 4 |
| 2025 | 23.0 | 3 |
Nobody in our records has strung together more than seven straight 10-sack seasons. Garrett is at eight and counting, and the only year he missed the mark was his rookie season, when he played eleven games. Underneath it runs a second streak that gets no attention: a forced fumble in all nine seasons, 23 in total, with three or more in five of them. He does not just arrive, he takes the ball with him.
Why it matters. Season-long sack totals bounce around for everyone, which makes an eight-year floor of ten the more impressive number than the 23. The forced fumbles matter for a separate reason: unlike team takeaway totals, an individual defender's strip production actually carries from one year to the next, so it is one of the few things in his line that can be projected rather than merely admired.
The best pass-rushing season in our records belonged to a team that won five games.
Anomaly18-sack seasons since 1999, and the team's record that year
| Player | Season | Team | Sacks | Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Myles Garrett | 2025 | CLE | 23.0 | 5-12 |
| Michael Strahan | 2001 | NYG | 22.5 | 7-9 |
| T.J. Watt | 2021 | PIT | 22.5 | 9-7 |
| Jared Allen | 2011 | MIN | 22.0 | 3-13 |
| J.J. Watt | 2012 | HOU | 20.5 | 12-4 |
| Aaron Donald | 2018 | LA | 20.5 | 13-3 |
| Nick Bosa | 2022 | SF | 18.5 | 13-4 |
Cleveland while Myles Garrett played there
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Record, 2017 to 2025 | 58-90-1 |
| Winning seasons | 2 of 9 |
| 2025 record | 5-12 |
| 2025 defense, EPA allowed per play | 5th in the NFL |
| 2025 team sacks | 53, 3rd in the NFL |
Cleveland fielded the fifth-best defense in football by expected points allowed per play in 2025 and won five games. Across Garrett's nine seasons the franchise went 58-90-1 with two winning years, and he was there for the 0-16 season as a rookie. Of the 22 seasons since 1999 in which a player recorded 18 or more sacks, only Jared Allen's 3-13 Vikings and Michael Strahan's 4-12 Giants came from a worse team.
Why it matters. Defensive production is usually flattered by good teams: a lead forces dropbacks, and dropbacks are where sacks come from. Garrett got the opposite, nine years of trailing early on offenses that could not stay on the field, and produced the record anyway. It is the strongest available argument that the number is about him rather than about circumstance.
Los Angeles, and what history says
What happens next: every 18-sack season since 1999 was followed by a smaller one. All 21 of them. The call is double digits, under 18.
Seasons of 18 or more sacks, 1999-2024: what came next
| Measure | Result |
|---|---|
| Cases | 21 |
| Average sacks in the big season | 19.8 |
| Average the following season | 8.5 |
| Declined | 21 of 21 |
| Best follow-up total | 17.5, J.J. Watt in 2015 |
| Follow-ups under 10 sacks | 10 of 21 |
The closest comparisons, and the mover cohort
| Case | Season | Sacks | Next year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Michael Strahan | 2001 | 22.5 | 11.0 |
| T.J. Watt | 2021 | 22.5 | 5.5 |
| Jared Allen | 2011 | 22.0 | 12.0 |
| Justin Houston | 2014 | 22.0 | 7.5 |
| Rushers with 12+ sacks who changed teams | 14 cases | 13.4 avg | 9.7 avg, 11 of 14 declined |
Garrett does both risky things at once in 2026: he follows a record season, and he does it in a new building. Twenty-one players have posted an 18-sack season since 1999 and all twenty-one recorded fewer the next year, falling from an average of 19.8 to 8.5; the best any of them managed was J.J. Watt's 17.5. Separately, pass rushers coming off a 12-sack season who changed teams dropped from 13.4 to 9.7, with 11 of 14 declining. The gradeable call: Garrett finishes 2026 with at least 10 sacks and fewer than 18, and Los Angeles improves on its 47 team sacks. He opens 2026 at 30, young enough by pass-rusher standards that the top of that range is the fairer expectation than the middle.
Why it matters. The cleanest reading here is that a 23-sack season measures an extraordinary player and an extraordinary run of opportunity at the same time, and only the first half repeats. Nothing in this projection is a statement about decline: the same history says a double-digit season is close to a formality for a rusher of this quality, and his eight-year streak of them is the longest in our records.
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