By Zac Wassink
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Last updated 7/12/21
New York Giants legend and Hall of Famer Michael Strahan controversially set the official record for most sacks in a season in January 2002 with 22.5 after Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre may or may not have taken a dive to the ground:
It turns out Strahan's mark may be even more illegitimate than critics say.
As Mike Lynch wrote for Sports Reference, the NFL only officially began tracking individual player sacks in 1982, but Pro Football Researchers Association members John Turney and Nick Webster have worked to compile sack numbers from the 1960s through 1981. They found that Al "Bubba" Baker tallied 23 sacks his rookie campaign in 1978, a number never topped by Strahan or anybody else.