Leading up to Sunday’s 2023 season opener at Acrisure Stadium between the San Francisco 49ers and the Pittsburgh Steelers, much of the attention from a matchup-based standpoint was focused on the very real, quite clear matchup advantage that the Steelers had with star pass rusher T.J. Watt going against new San Francisco starting right tackle Colton McKivitz.
Prior to Sunday, McKivitz had played just 466 offensive snaps in his first three NFL seasons with 296 of them coming at right guard and the other 146 snaps coming at tackle. However, just 29 of those 146 snaps were at right tackle.
Going against the 2021 NFL Defensive Player of the Year in Watt, McKivitz had his hands full, struggling to protect quarterback Brock Purdy as Watt recorded three sacks, six pressures and forced two fumbles. Watt, put simply, dominated the matchup from start to finish.
The fact that Watt won so handily in the match against McKivitz wasn’t a surprise to Pro Football Focus’ Steve Palazzolo and Sam Monson. What was the surprise though in Sunday’s 30-7 loss was that Watt’s dominance did not slow down the 49ers’ offense.
“The thing is, T.J. Watt smoked Colton McKivitz at right tackle, and it still didn’t matter,” Monson said, according to video via the PFF NFL Show on YouTube. “He won that matchup comfortably and was absolutely destroying him. …it didn’t affect San Francisco whatsoever. It didn’t matter.”
Watt was a force off the edge in the loss, generating the NFL’s highest pass rush grade of Week 1 (so far) at 94.9 overall. On top of that, Watt had a pass-rush win rate of 23.1 percent and added the six pressures to go with the two strip sacks. Though he was winning that matchup easily from start to finish on Sunday against McKivitz, remarkably it didn’t matter for the 49ers, who moved the ball up and down the field with ease on Sunday.
“We highlighted that, we were like that’s the matchup. If you would have told me on Thursday that T.J. Watt was … going to win that matchup, force two strips, it would be like ‘Alright, Pittsburgh has a chance this weekend,'” Palazzolo added, according to video via the PFF NFL Show.
It really didn’t matter. That’s the deflating part about Watt’s dominance.
Granted, all three of his sacks came with the Steelers trailing 17-0 or worse; so they didn’t exactly change the game entirely. Watt’s strip sack in the first half seemingly halted a San Francisco drive, but somehow Purdy recovered the football behind his back, leading to a San Francisco field goal.
Watt’s second strip sack was all for naught as the Steelers turned the ball over on downs deep in San Francisco territory, all but sealing the win for the 49ers.
The former DPOY was as good as he’s ever been, but even his heroics couldn’t change the outcome Sunday. That’s a little deflating.
