Los Angeles Rams star DT Aaron Donald just recently announced his retirement as one of three people in NFL history to win three Defensive Player of the Year Awards—but he believes Pittsburgh Steelers OLB T.J. Watt should have joined him by now, if not, indeed, replaced him in that group.
Donald won the award three times in a four-year span, his final honor coming in 2020. Watt finished second to him before winning his first Defensive Player of the Year Award a year later. In an extensive interview for the Rams’ website, he acknowledged Watt as the game’s great defender today.
“I would say T.J. Watt. He’s another guy that’s consistently been doing it, every single year,” he said via the team’s website. “He’s a guy that’s gonna consistently get 15 sacks for you, 20 TFLs, probably 2 interceptions, maybe a touchdown for sure.”
“I felt like he should’ve won a couple more Defensive Player [of the Year Awards], he kind of got snubbed a couple times, I ain’t gonna lie”, he continued. Since 2019, Watt has finished in second or third place for the award three times, including to Donald in 2020. He finished third in 2019 when CB Stephon Gilmore won, and most infamously in second in 2023. Despite having better statistics across the board, he finished second to the Cleveland Browns’ Myles Garrett.
For the record, Donald never explicitly says that Watt should have won the award over him in 2020. He could just as easily be talking about his losses to Gilmore and Garrett in 2019 and 2023, respectively. As noted, he won in 2021, and in 2022, he spent most of the season injured or playing through injury.
Interviewed by his wife, Erica, he also said that he has no regrets about not playing for the Steelers. Born in Pittsburgh and a Pittsburgh Panthers legend, he never wore the Black and Gold, but he loved playing for Sean McVay and the Los Angeles Rams.
She asked him who the next Aaron Donald is, but he changed the phrasing of the question to essentially mean the best defender in the game today, and he quickly chose Watt—not Garrett, one of the Bosas, not Micah Parsons.
“I’m big on you gotta show me more than one or two years,” he said. “[Watt] consistently dominates year in and year out, so that’s a guy I felt like, if anybody, they need to be chasing him…He’s that guy right now, I think.”
Since coming into the league as a first-round pick in 2017, Watt has followed a Hall of Fame trajectory. He has 96.5 career sacks with 107 tackles for loss, 27 forced fumbles, and seven interceptions. Donald referenced looking at what Watt did in any particular week and feeling fueled to best his stat line.
T.J. Watt is that guy. Even if he doesn’t have the hardware.
