There are 50 voting members for the annual AP awards that get given out at the NFL Honors event. For now, we know at least one of those voters is still thinking T.J. Watt for Defensive Player of the Year.
Adam Schein discussed Watt during CBS Sports’ That Other Pregame Show and stated that Watt would get his vote if the season ended today. However, he reiterated how important this final six-game stretch will be.
“The Pittsburgh Steelers are an average team when T.J. Watt doesn’t sack the quarterback in the game, 5-4 in the last two seasons when T.J. doesn’t get a sack,” Schein said. “I want this on record. I have a vote for all the awards. T.J. Watt is still my Defensive Player of the Year.
“He didn’t do anything against Cleveland, and they lost the game. This is a monster stretch for T.J. Watt. If the season ends today, and it doesn’t, he would still get my votes.”
Watt is experiencing a bit of a down year compared to his typical standards. He has 7.5 sacks through 11 games. He has more zero-sack games (five) than multi-sack games (two). That isn’t atypical for most players, but it is for Watt, who has led the league in sacks in three of the last four seasons.
While Watt hasn’t logged his typical amount of sacks, he still has 18 QB hits, 13 tackles for loss, four forced fumbles, and three passes defensed on the season. He deserves consideration for the DPOY award, but I am not sure I would even vote for him in first place at this point.
Notably, Myles Garrett made a claim to the DPOY award last week after defeating the Steelers with three sacks and a forced fumble, telling the world that the DPOY conversation runs through him.
Garrett is in third place for the sack crown right now with 10.0 sacks, and Watt is all the way down at 13. We all know Watt is more than capable of a three-sack performance to get right back in the mix for the DPOY award and the sack crown, but he hasn’t been able to get going much this season. He is being chipped at an absurdly high rate.
We will see if Watt can state his case over the final six weeks. If he does well, he will have Hard Knocks at his disposal to help him, but the same can be said about Garrett and Bengals DE Trey Hendrickson.
