Position | Linebacker
Born | Fort Bragg, North Carolina
Date-of-Birth | August 13, 1941
Height | 6’2″
Weight | 218 lbs
College | North Carolina
NFL Career | 14 seasons Teams | Washington Redskins 1965-1978
Career Highlights
- 18th-round pick (245th overall) of the Washington Redskins in the 1965 NFL Draft
- 9x Pro Bowl selection — still the most in franchise history
- NFC Defensive Player of the Year (1972)
- Started 135 consecutive games (1968-1977), a streak broken only by an emergency appendectomy
- Defensive signal-caller for George Allen’s “Over the Hill Gang” (1973-1977)
- Helped lead Washington to its first Super Bowl appearance (Super Bowl VII)
- Pro Football Hall of Fame inductee (2011), enshrined as a Senior Candidate 33 years after retirement
- Washington Redskins Ring of Fame
- 80 Greatest Redskins
Awards
- 5x First-team All-Pro (1969, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1976)
- Second-team All-Pro (1974)
- 9x Pro Bowl (1966-1969, 1972-1976)
- 2x First-team All-ACC at North Carolina (1963, 1964)
Chris Hanburger: The Best Player Washington Almost Never Had
Chris Hanburger was a 245th overall pick who nearly didn’t play college football at all, let alone professionally. Instead, he became the most decorated defender in franchise history — a nine-time Pro Bowler whose Pro Bowl total still stands as a Washington record, decades after his final snap.
The Longest of Long Shots
Hanburger was born at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, the son of an Army colonel, and grew up moving around military postings before settling at Hampton High School in Virginia. Rather than follow his father to a new posting in Alaska, he enlisted in the Army just eleven days after graduating high school, serving two years before an eye-socket injury during a flag football game ended his hopes of becoming an officer.
Only after his discharge did he accept a scholarship to the University of North Carolina, where he played center on offense and middle linebacker on defense, earning All-ACC honors as both a junior and senior.
None of that was enough to interest most NFL teams. Washington took him in the 18th round of the 1965 draft, 245th overall — the kind of pick that rarely makes a roster, let alone a Hall of Fame case.
Hall of Fame linebacker Sam Huff, then in his final NFL seasons, took an interest in the raw rookie during his first training camp and convinced him he could make the team. By Week 6 of his rookie year, Hanburger was starting. By his second season, the job was permanently his.
The Hangman Earns His Name
Hanburger never played big. He rarely topped 215 pounds, undersized even by the standards of his era, and he adapted his technique to survive against bigger men.
Rather than wrap up low like a textbook tackler, he drove his forearm high, across the chest and shoulders of ball carriers, again and again. It was perfectly legal at the time, and it was devastating. NFL Films president Steve Sabol once marveled at the habit: “He would go a whole game and not make a tackle below the jaw line.”
The style earned him a nickname that stuck for the rest of his career: “The Hangman.” Huff, who mentored him early and later called him one of the best blitzers he’d ever seen, put it simply: “Nine Pro Bowls tells you that guy could play.”
Defensive Quarterback of the Over the Hill Gang
Hanburger’s game went far beyond physicality. When George Allen took over as head coach in 1971 and built his “Over the Hill Gang” around proven veterans, Hanburger became the unquestioned brain of the defense. From 1973 through 1977, he called Washington’s defensive signals outright, working from a playbook of more than 100 audibles he could shift into before the snap.
His best season came in 1972. Hanburger intercepted four passes, including a 41-yard pick-six off Joe Namath, and was named NFC Defensive Player of the Year as Washington’s defense anchored a run to the franchise’s first-ever Super Bowl appearance. He added two tackles and six assists in the NFC Championship Game, a 26-3 rout of Dallas, before Washington fell to Miami’s undefeated Dolphins in Super Bowl VII.
Durability defined him as much as any single season did. Beginning in 1968, Hanburger started 135 consecutive games — a streak that didn’t end because of injury on the field, but because of an emergency appendectomy in 1977.
He came back that same season and recorded three sacks against the Rams in the finale, then played one more year before retiring in 1978.
The Longest Wait for Canton
Hanburger’s Hall of Fame case sat untouched for decades. He didn’t get inducted until 2011, as a Senior Candidate, 33 years after his final game — one of the longer waits of any Redskins great.
When he finally gave his enshrinement speech, one week shy of his 70th birthday, he turned the moment away from himself entirely. “I don’t consider myself a true Hall of Famer,” he told the crowd in Canton, crediting the teammates around him instead.
It fit the player perfectly. Asked years later to name his favorite memory from a 14-year career full of individual honors, Hanburger didn’t mention the Pro Bowls, the All-Pro nods, or even Super Bowl VII. “My favorite moment was when the games were over,” he said.
Legacy
Hanburger’s nine Pro Bowl selections remain a franchise record no one else has matched. He sits in Washington’s Ring of Fame and among the franchise’s 90 Greatest, a permanent fixture of the Allen-era defenses that turned Washington from also-rans into perennial contenders.
For a player once considered too small and too late a pick to matter, Chris Hanburger ended up as good as anyone who’s ever worn burgundy and gold.
Plenty of longtime fans would argue he is simply the best, full stop.
Career Statistics
| Team | Year | G | GS | Int | FR | Sk |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Washington | 1965 | 14 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2.0 |
| Washington | 1966 | 13 | 13 | 1 | 1 | 5.0 |
| Washington | 1967 | 13 | 13 | 0 | 0 | 5.0 |
| Washington | 1968 | 14 | 14 | 2 | 1 | 5.5 |
| Washington | 1969 | 14 | 14 | 0 | 3 | 1.5 |
| Washington | 1970 | 14 | 14 | 1 | 2 | 2.5 |
| Washington | 1971 | 14 | 14 | 1 | 2 | 5.0 |
| Washington | 1972 | 14 | 14 | 4 | 2 | 3.5 |
| Washington | 1973 | 14 | 14 | 1 | 1 | 3.0 |
| Washington | 1974 | 14 | 14 | 4 | 2 | 2.0 |
| Washington | 1975 | 14 | 14 | 3 | 2 | 3.5 |
| Washington | 1976 | 14 | 14 | 1 | 0 | 2.5 |
| Washington | 1977 | 5 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 3.5 |
| Washington | 1978 | 16 | 16 | 0 | 0 | 1.0 |
| Career Total | 14 seasons | 187 | 177 | 19 | 17 | 45.5 |
G = Games played, GS = Games started, Int = Interceptions, FR = Fumble recoveries, Sk = Sacks. Hanburger also scored 5 career defensive touchdowns (2 on interception returns, 3 on fumble recoveries). Note: the NFL did not officially track sacks league-wide until 1982 — season-by-season sack totals here reflect Pro Football Reference’s historical research rather than official in-season league records. Individual tackle totals are not reliably documented for this era and are omitted rather than estimated. Stats via Pro Football Reference.