If you circle the moment that it was apparent the Pittsburgh Steelers were in massive trouble as they rounded into January and the playoffs, it would probably be in Week 15 against the Philadelphia Eagles. After two 13-play drives to start the second half, the Eagles got the ball back with 10:29 remaining and finished in victory formation after 21 plays. Eagles OT Lane Johnson had a tough matchup against T.J. Watt and handled it well, but that doesn’t mean it was easy.
“It was a battle, I mean T.J.’s out there just fuckin’ bringing hell on Earth,” Johnson said via Pardon My Take on YouTube. “I feel like that game, physically, was probably the most tired I was all season.”
Johnson was giving Watt his due respect, but it’s probably no surprise that Johnson was the most physically exhausted he had been all season after that game. It was one of the most lopsided time of possesssion breakdowns since the turn of the millennium. The Steelers only possessed the ball for 20:08 during that game, including just 5:50 in the second half.
Watt managed to have one of his better games of the season against the Eagles. He finished the day with seven total tackles, two sacks, one tackle for loss, two QB hits, and five total pressures.
For his effort, Pro Football Focus gave Watt an 88.8 overall grade, which was his fifth-best mark of the season. Johnson was given a 69.3 overall grade for that game, but he allowed just one of those pressures and committed one penalty in the process of containing Watt.
Those two sacks ended up being Watt’s final two of the season. He was held without a sack in the Steelers’ final five games, including their playoff loss to the Baltimore Ravens.
Johnson is one of the best and most experienced tackles in the league while Watt is one of the best and most experienced EDGE players in the league. It was a matchup of good on good. Just glancing at the stats, Watt won that matchup, but given the outcome of the game, I’m not sure you can point to any Steelers defender “winning” any matchups.
Still, Johnson gave Watt his due respect as being one of the toughest matchups of the season. That includes games against Myles Garrett, Kyle Van Noy, Trey Hendrickson, Micah Parsons, and some of the other elite EDGE players in the league right now.
