History
The term "Quarterback sack" was first coined by Hall of Fame defensive end Deacon Jones. Jones, who played in the NFL from 1961 to 1974, felt that a sack devastated the offense in the same way that a city was devastated when it was sacked.
However, the term "sack" was not widely used before ca. 1970; previously one would simply refer to a player's being tackled behind the line (of scrimmage), in so many words. The NFL only began to keep track of times a quarterback was sacked since 1963 and sacks by defensive players in 1982. Team records have been kept at least since the 1940s.
An alternative explanation for the origin of the term is the practice of the referee to mark the point where forward progress is stopped, as tackles against the quarterback often result in his being pushed back from the point of contact, by throwing a beanbag or bean sack on the ground at that point. Seeing the sack thrown may have led coaches and commentators to say the QB was "sacked".
Read more about this topic: Quarterback Sack
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“All history becomes subjective; in other words there is properly no history, only biography.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“As History stands, it is a sort of Chinese Play, without end and without lesson.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)
“All history attests that man has subjected woman to his will, used her as a means to promote his selfish gratification, to minister to his sensual pleasures, to be instrumental in promoting his comfort; but never has he desired to elevate her to that rank she was created to fill. He has done all he could to debase and enslave her mind; and now he looks triumphantly on the ruin he has wrought, and say, the being he has thus deeply injured is his inferior.”
—Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)