CLEVELAND, Ohio — While the Cleveland Browns' season continues circling the drain, one storyline is becoming increasingly impossible to ignore: Myles Garrett is putting together one of the most dominant defensive campaigns in NFL history.
The All-Pro edge rusher added four more sacks to his season total in Sunday’s loss to Baltimore, bringing him to 15 sacks with seven games still remaining. This remarkable pace has the Orange and Brown Talk podcast hosts believing he’ll not just break but demolish the NFL’s single-season sack record.
“It’s mind blowing how well he’s playing. It really is,” Browns beat reporter Mary Kay Cabot said on the latest podcast episode. “I mean, I really 100% think that he is going to obliterate the sack record 22 ½ sacks. It’s shared by Michael Strahan and T.J. Watt and I think he is blowing past that.”
Garrett’s performance against Baltimore wasn’t just about volume — the quality of his sacks stood out as well. As podcast host Dan Labbe noted, “There were no cheap sacks today.” Garrett is consistently making impact plays when the Browns need them most, often on crucial third downs.
“He has put his money where his mouth is and he’s playing great,” Labbe said. “And this is sort of the season, I’ve called it the Pro Football Reference page season where, you know, in 20 years we’re going to look at his Pro Football Reference page and be like, ‘Oh yeah, I remember that year.’ This is a Defensive Player of the Year type season right now.”
What makes Garrett’s dominance even more remarkable is that he’s achieving it amid a disastrous team season. Traditionally, Defensive Player of the Year honors go to standouts on playoff contenders, but Garrett’s performance may be too overwhelming to ignore even with Cleveland sitting at 2-8.
“I do feel horrible for him that it is coming in such an awful, awful season,” Cabot said. “It’s one of the most dominant seasons of any defensive player anywhere at any point in history. And we are witnessing it and it’s going for nothing.”
If there’s one remaining question about Garrett’s historic season, it’s whether he can maintain this torrid pace through the final seven games. Browns reporter Ashley Bastock highlighted this as a key distinction from some of his previous seasons.
" I think part of this next step for Myles is continuing this production to close out the season," Bastock explained. “The other missing piece is this idea of can he continue that production and continue to be disruptive and not have a drop off.”
Past seasons have seen Garrett’s production sometimes decline due to injuries — a shoulder issue, COVID-19 or lower-body injuries that limited his effectiveness. But so far in 2025, he’s shown no signs of slowing down. If anything, he’s getting stronger as the season progresses.
Could he reach 25 or even approach 30 sacks? With matchups against teams like the Raiders coming up, it’s not out of the question. But the achievement, while individually spectacular, will likely come with a bittersweet taste given the team’s overall performance.
“I can’t believe that the Browns had a guy who had 27 sacks and they won five games,” Labbe said, projecting forward to season’s end. “It’s just going to be like, I can’t believe that.”
For the full breakdown of Garrett’s historic season and expert analysis on whether he’ll break the NFL sack record, check out the complete Orange and Brown Talk podcast episode with Dan Labbe, Mary Kay Cabot and Ashley Bastock.
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