Titans rookie punter Ryan Stonehouse broke the NFL’s oldest single-season record in 2022.
Stonehouse averaged 53.1 yards per punt during the regular season, setting a new single-season record. The previous record of 51.4 yards per punt was set by Sammy Baugh in 1940.
The 2022 National Football League Record & Fact Book listed Baugh’s 82-year-old record as the oldest single-season record in the NFL.
Baugh, a Hall of Fame quarterback, was playing a very different sport in 1940. He routinely quick-kicked when lined up as a quarterback and was therefore standing closer to the line of scrimmage when punting, and the other team often didn’t have a returner ready to field the punt, so Baugh’s punting distance would frequently benefit from the ball rolling well past its landing spot. Those differences in the way the game was played made Baugh’s record nearly unbreakable.
But Stonehouse broke it, and broke it by a significant margin.