2026 NFL Honors: Browns’ Myles Garrett named Defensive Player of Year
SAN FRANCISCO — As if there was any doubt, Myles Garrett won the 2025 Defensive Player of the Year award, officially receiving the honor unanimously during NFL Honors on Thursday night. This comes after the Cleveland Browns passer orchestrated a banner year, breaking the single-season sack record with 23. This is the second DPOY award Garrett has won in his career, with the first coming in 2023.
Garrett’s 23 sacks surpassed Michael Strahan (2001) and TJ Watt (2021), who jointly held the record with 22.5. In addition to sacks, Garrett had 33 tackles for loss, which was the second most in the NFL over the last 25 years. His 39 quarterback hits also ranked second in the league in 2025.
The former No. 1 overall pick in the 2017 NFL Draft was head and shoulders above the rest of his peers this season when it came to sacking the quarterback. Garrett had 6.5 more sacks than the next closest player this season (Brian Burns with 16.5).
One criticism of Garrett breaking the sack record was that the Browns passer had the luxury of one extra game with the NFL moving to an 18-week (17-game) regular season in 2021. However, as CBS Sports Research notes, Garrett actually had fewer chances to collect sacks this season than Strahan and Watt.
In 2025, the Browns faced 562 dropbacks, which was the third-fewest number in the NFL. When Strahan broke the record in 2001, his Giants suffered 576 losses. As for Watt, his Steelers faced 649 declines in 2021 when he tied with Strahan. This further highlights how impressive and dominant Garrett was this season.
Garrett beat out a field of finalists consisting of Will Anderson Jr. (Texans), Nik Bonitto (Broncos), Aidan Hutchinson (Lions) and Micah Parsons (Packers) for the award.
