Although T.J. Watt has made a play or two, Steelers opponents continue to neutralize him, and it’s glaringly obvious. As Charlie Batch discussed on 102.5 WDVE yesterday, teams are avoiding him, and not just on passing downs. He says it’s up to Teryl Austin to resolve this problem, which is even more important with Alex Highsmith sidelined.
“They’re moving him in the pass rush, on third downs”, Batch said. “But you now have to do that in the run game. Right now, they are truly predictable as it relates to where they’re gonna line up. You just look at the run charts; they are running completely away from T.J. at this point. And hopefully, maybe he runs it down, but if he runs it down, it’s already gonna be a five- or a six-yard gain”.
In the season opener, Watt actually did have two tackles for loss on Breece Hall backside runs. He didn’t have any such plays on Sunday, though all four of his tackles qualified as run stops. Three gained two or fewer yards, the other gaining six on 3rd and 7.
But it’s no secret that opposing offenses are literally running away from T.J. Watt. We can clearly illustrate that from the run charts for the first two weeks, with broad yellow lines going the other way from where he lines up.
Exiting last season, Watt said he needed to be more open to moving around. Of course, just lining up on the other side of the field won’t stop teams from running the other way. But at the very least, it could help force them to declare their intentions by audibling.
“These types of things have to be cleaned up, and that is 100 percent on Teryl Austin to try to figure out how he can now try to start to confuse these [offenses]”, Batch said, regarding the deployment of T.J. Watt. “Because right now, it seems like the offenses are one step ahead of where he’s at”.
Through two games, the Steelers have allowed 789 yards and 63 points. Even if the special teams unit allowed seven of those points, that’s still unacceptable. They are allowing 6.3 yards per play, which is shockingly poor and the fourth-worst mark in the league. There is too much going wrong, frankly, for Watt to be able to solve.
Meanwhile, Watt is in the midst of the longest drought of his career. Going back to last season, he has failed to record a sack in his last five games—six including the playoffs. Prior to this run, he had never gone more than three games without a sack, which he only did twice. He has two passes defensed and some tackles for loss, but he clearly isn’t having Defensive Player of the Year showings. Part of that is how offenses are responding to him, sure, but there’s more to it than that.
