No. 8 Bengals draft pick of all-time: Eddie Edwards

NOTE: These all-time draft posts are re-posts from previous years. Since there hasn't been many changes over the years, our top-10 lists are relatively the same.

Without doing a Google search, or scouring the pages of Bengals.com, name the player that owns the franchise's all-time sack record. You didn't actually read the title, did you? The truth is, Eddie Edwards is an historic player, rarely referenced by the media or even fans, especially when listing the typical talking points of Bengals legends, most of whom are offensive players. But, the Bengals have had some tremendously productive defensive players too, one of whom is Eddie Edwards.

A consensus All-American defensive end at the University of Miami, the Cincinnati Bengals used their third overall selection in the 1977 NFL draft to select Eddie Edwards. Spending his entire career in a Bengals uniform, Edwards' mark of 83.5 quarterback sacks leads all Bengals players. By a lot. Reggie Williams ranks second all-time and he still falls 21 sacks short of Edwards' mark. Carlos Dunlap averages 7.1 sacks per year -- it would take him nearly 12 seasons of consistent play to reach Edwards' mark.

Only 47.5 quarterback sacks are considered "official" (he played several seasons before the NFL recognized quarterback sacks). And he STILL leads the franchise.

Edwards also recovered 17 fumbles and was one of six players to play in both of franchise's Super Bowls. If not for Coy Bacon's ridiculous 22 quarterback sacks in 1976 (considered unofficial), Edwards would own two of the top three franchise marks for quarterback sacks in a single season.

Antwan Odom posted five quarterback sacks against the Green Bay Packers in 2009 and yet, he simply tied Edwards' franchise mark of 5.0 quarterback sacks in a single game. Edwards remembers that day "like it was yesterday" with the Bengals concluding their 1980 season and the Browns gearing up for the playoffs with quarterback Brian Sipe.

"To tell you the truth, I wanted to hurry up and play the game and get back to Florida; It was just too cold," said Edwards, who grew up in Fort Pierce, Fla., and went to the University of Miami. "Sipe ran around a lot like Fran Tarkenton and everything I did that day worked. I did swim moves where I'd head butt (the tackle) and go over the guy's shoulder or do a rip move and go underneath him. That day, everything our line coach (Dick Modzelewski) told me worked."

Edwards' final game came in Super Bowl XXIII where he "begged head coach Sam Wyche to dress him out in front of family and friends because he had a pretty good idea this was it." Wyche dressed him and allowed him a couple of snaps.

Edwards now lives in Fort Lauderdale, working at a concrete company as a supervisor.