We now know Pittsburgh Steelers OLB T.J. Watt isn’t getting all 50 of the 50 Defensive Player of the Year votes this year. And based on all speculation, Watt isn’t likely to take home the trophy.
In his weekly Football Morning in America column for NBC Sports, King, one of the 50 official voters for the NFL’s yearly awards, chose Cleveland Browns DE Myles Garrett over Watt for this year’s Defensive Player of the Year.
His column provides a detailed explanation of the candidates and options, including Watt and Garrett in his top five alongside Las Vegas’ Maxx Crosby, the Los Angeles Chargers’ Khalil Mack, and Dallas’ Micah Parsons. In the end, he gave the nod to Garrett, writing:
“I picked Garrett. In order, my top five were Garrett, Parsons, Watt, Crosby and Mack. Garrett was high in both PFF grade and Next Gen pass-rush metrics, and his team was the number one defense in football.”
Meaning Watt came in third place on King’s list behind Garrett and Parsons. King is using PFF’s debated metrics that give Garrett the edge in advanced stats like pass-rush win rate, a measure of how often a pass rusher beats his blocker, even if it didn’t turn into a pressure or sack. King notes the ballots were due 12 days ago, at the end of the regular season, and before Garrett’s goose egg in the Browns’ Wild Card Round loss to the Houston Texans. The award is given for regular season play only. At least, that’s the intent.
On the field, King focused on Garrett’s field goal block in a one-point win over the Indianapolis Colts, the seventh-year veteran leaping over the line to smack away this attempt.
For King, those high-impact plays won out over Watt’s better box score numbers. Watt finished the year with more tackles, more sacks, more QB hits, more tackles for loss, more pass deflections, and more interceptions than Garrett while recording the same number of forced fumbles.
Though analytics played a role, King said his criteria was more intangible.
“My criteria is not precise. Which player lifts his defense the most, perhaps making a good defense great? Which player both masters the new-age metrics and passes the eye test for major impact all season? How do players and coaches and GMs I’ve spoken with during the year rate the best players?”
Watt’s proven to be as valuable to his defense as anyone in football. Without him, the Steelers are 1-11, including losing to the Buffalo Bills in a Wild Card Round game, Watt sidelined due to an MCL sprain. King also cited advanced stats for giving Garrett the edge, citing Watt’s worse win-rate and pressure rate.
“Per Next Gen Stats, though, Watt had a pressure rate of 13.7 percent per rush—good, but down the list from the best edge-rushers.”
Based on King’s vote and, more importantly, AP All-Pro vote totals that awarded Garrett significantly more votes than Watt, Garrett seems poised to take home the first DPOY of his career.
This wouldn’t be the first time one of King’s votes drew the ire of Steelers’ fans. In 2020, he revealed that he did not vote for Troy Polamalu for the Hall of Fame. Despite being worthy of Canton, King reasoned that because all the other voters would select Polamalu, he would use his vote for a borderline player to improve their odds. An idea that completely runs counter to the actual voting process, though Polamalu obviously was enshrined on his first ballot.
If Watt wins, he’ll join a rare club of two-time victors. But Garrett is the clear favorite. The award will officially be announced during NFL Honors on Feb. 8 beginning at 9 PM/EST.
