Not all sacks in the NFL are created the same, that much is certain.
That’s why Trench Warfare’s Brandon Thorn tracks sacks through his True Sack Score metrics, which measures sacks based on four different types: rare high quality; high quality; low quality; and coverage/cleanup.
Unsurprisingly, Pittsburgh Steelers star pass rusher T.J. Watt leads the NFL in not only sacks through the first five weeks with 8.0, he also leads Thorn’s True Sack Score metrics with no other pass rusher even close.
Thorn has Watt down for a score of 9 in his True Sack Rate with Watt having all of his sacks come as at least high quality (one point).
“Watt added another two HQ sacks in Week 5 against two different Ravens right tackles (Patrick Mekari & Daniel Faalele), using the ‘ghost’ technique for both. Watt is off to a red-hot start as a rusher this season and is batting 1000 with 9/9 of his sacks being HQ,” Thorn writes regarding Watt as the leader of his True Sack Rate metric.
Watt leads Cincinnati’s Trey Hendrickson (6 TSR), Los Angeles’ Khalil Mack (5.5 TSR), Cleveland’s Myles Garrett (5.5 TSR) and Green Bay’s Rashan Gary (5 TSR) inside the top five for Trench Warfare.
In the first five weeks of the season, Watt has been largely outstanding, save for a disappointing performance in Week Four against the Houston Texans. According to Pro Football Focus, Watt holds a 91.6 overall grade, including a 90.9 as a pass rusher. The 91.6 overall grade is good for third in the NFL at the EDGE position from PFF, behind San Francisco’s Nick Bosa and Cleveland’s Garrett.
Watt’s pass-rush grade is good for fifth best, too, behind Garrett, Bosa, Tennessee’s Trevis Gipson and Hendrickson.
Yet, Watt has the best True Sack Rate by a mile, which is key.
According to Thorn’s charting, Watt is averaging a sack every 21.1 pass rushes, which is third-best in the NFL behind Hendrickson (19.5) and Gary (19.0). Garrett is averaging a sack every 25.0 pass rushes. On top of that, Watt’s sacks are a drive-killer 63% of the time, which is one of the higher marks in the league for a guy over 150 pass-rush snaps.
After dealing with injuries in 2022 that slowed him down and led to just 5.5 sacks, Watt has found his 2021 NFL Defensive Player of the Year form once again and finds himself on pace to shatter the NFL’s single-season sacks record through five weeks. That should put him in line to win a second DPOY award, all but cementing his Hall of Fame candidacy.
