If you have no skin in this game and I can give you one reason to tune in anyway, it's the 6-foot-5, 290-pound, 25-year-old beast that is J.J. Watt. How often can you call a guy a virtual lock for a major award only six weeks into a season? That might be the case in terms of Watt's quest to capture his second Defensive Player of the Year Award.
In fact, the buzz on Watt is so strong right now that he's become a trendy early-season
MVP candidate. Defensive players simply don't win that award—none have since Lawrence Taylor in 1986—but Watt might be dominant enough to change that.
I mean, just look at this season's top league-wide grades from Pro Football Focus:
HIGHEST PFF GRADES ENTERING WEEK 7
PLAYERGRADE
1. J.J. Watt35.9
2.
Muhammad Wilkerson18.7
3.
Von Miller17.5
4.
Marshal Yanda16.9
5.
Kawann Short16.2
It's also pretty amazing, considering that his primary job is to prevent touchdowns from happening, that the 2011 No. 11 overall pick has
scored three touchdowns in six games. That's more than
LeSean McCoy,
Frank Gore,
Chris Johnson and Le'Veon Bell. Hell, it's more than Houston's top receiver, Andre Johnson.
As a pass rusher, he's pressured the quarterback seven times per game this season. He's got four sacks, 26 tackles, six passes defensed and a league-high 20 quarterback hits. Oh, and he has an interception, which occurred inside the red zone during the second half of a one-score game and was returned for an 80-yard touchdown.
Later that same game, it was his pressure on
Bills quarterback
EJ Manuel which sparked the game-clinching interception.
2. Mismatch of the week: J.J. Watt vs. Pittbsburgh's tackles
Watt's been able to pick on some vulnerable right tackles this season. Texans defensive coordinator Romeo Crennel lines him up in various spots, just as Wade Phillips did, but he does seem to make the majority of his big plays while lining up on the left edge.
Just ask
Tyler Polumbus...
Or
Justin Pugh...
Watt has certainly benefited from going up against guys like Polumbus, Pugh and rookie Bills right tackle
Seantrel Henderson.
But his task doesn't look to be much more difficult this week. Since the start of the 2013 season, Steelers right tackle
Marcus Gilbert has been solely responsible for 15 sacks, according to Pro Football Focus. And entering Week 7, only one NFL quarterback has been sacked more than Pittsburgh's
Ben Roethlisberger.
League-wide, nine tackles have given up four or more sacks this year. Three of the players on that list—Polumbus, Pugh and Henderson—have already faced Watt and the Texans. Two more—Gilbert and Steelers left tackle
Kelvin Beachum—will have to meet them on Monday night.
MOST SACKS ALLOWED BY OTS, 2014
RANK/PLAYERSACKS ALLOWEDNOTES
1. Tyler Polumbus7Faced Watt Week 1
2.
Matt Kalil6
2. Justin Pugh6Faced Watt Week 3
4. Seantrel Henderson4Face Watt Week 4
4.
Justin Gilbert4Facing Watt Monday
4. Kelvin Beachem4Facing Watt Monday
4.
Jonathan Martin4
4.
Jordan Mills4
4.
Nate Solder4
Gilbert and Beachum have had their hands full against quality rushers like
Gerald McCoy,
Michael Johnson,
Elvis Dumervil and
Terrell Suggs, but they've also struggled with dudes like
Jabaal Sheard,
Billy Winn and
Mario Addison.
The Steelers can give those guys help the way the
Giants did with Pugh by tweaking blocking assignments from the interior of the line or by using tight ends in pass protection, but that Pittsburgh line is still probably in for its stiffest test of the year.
3. Jadeveon Clowney watch
Jadeveon Clowney has played just part of one game this season.
The test could be even more complex if Houston is able to use its rookie No. 1 overall pick for the first time since the season opener. Jadeveon Clowney was back practicing last week and has a chance to return from a torn meniscus Monday night.
That could be huge, because the kid was tearing it up in the preseason and looked primed to have a defensive rookie of the year-type season ahead of him before injuring that knee 23 snaps into his NFL career.
See, as good as Watt's been, the Houston defense has actually struggled. They have a sack rate of just 4.1, which ranks 23rd in the NFL, they've surrendered a shabby 4.4 yards per carry and they rank 28th in the league in pass defense.
Clowney probably can't be expected to be an every-down force right off the bat, but his presence alone would force the Steelers to take just a little bit of attention away from Watt.
4. Steelers look to get deep
There's more to this game than J.J. Watt and the potentially one-sided battle that will commence inside the trenches when Pittsburgh has the ball. For instance, we've yet to touch on the quarterback and their respective weapons. And Ben Roethlisberger has a chance to do some serious damage against a Houston secondary that was abused deep by
T.Y. Hilton in Week 6.
This on a 3rd-and-14:
The safety has to get over quicker than that.
And this was just too easy:
Finally, utterly blown coverage:
To be fair, both of these teams are vulnerable deep. Entering Week 7, nobody in football had surrendered more 30-yard passing plays on defense than them.
MOST 30-YARD PASS PLAYS ALLOWED THROUGH WEEK 6
TEAMTOTAL
Steelers10
Texans10
Falcons10
Jets10
Eagles10
NFL median7
NFL average6
NFL low2
Steelers hit on big plays consistently. And there's little reason to believe their top weapon,
Antonio Brown, can't pull a Hilton Monday evening.
Brown ranks second in the NFL with 11 20-yard catches this season. And among 52 qualifying receivers, PFF ranks him third when it comes to catch rates on deep receptions.
MOST CATCHES OF 20+ YARDS, 2014
RANK/PLAYERCATCHESCATCH RATE
1.
Julio Jones1361.5
2. Antonio Brown1147.1
3.
Steve Smith855.6
4. T.Y. Hilton845.5
Thing is, Houston will have to make sure the box remains relatively crowded with Le'Veon Bell posing a threat down low, and Brown can't be the only thing they focus on in coverage because the speedy
Markus Wheaton can burn them. Texans safety
Kendrick Lewis has the ability to help pick up one of those two guys on deep balls, but rookie
D.J. Swearinger is useless and both corners
Johnathan Joseph and
Kareem Jackson are vulnerable.
Yet another reason why the Texans must get a lights-out performance from Watt. If Big Ben has time, this defense will be in big trouble.
5. Texans are well-rested coming off a 10-day break
It helps that Houston is coming off a mini bye week. In spite of some defensive debacles, they came back from a 24-0 first-quarter deficit and nearly beat a strong Indianapolis team on the road on Thursday Night Football in Week 6.
With an extra day to prepare this week, star offensive contributors Arian Foster and Andre Johnson have had a chance to recover from groin injuries.
And it should be noted that while the Texans were terrible last season, one of their best performances of the year came after their bye, when they built a 24-13 second-half lead on Indy before losing a squeaker in the final minutes.
The Steelers haven't had a break yet and are coming off a loss to to the Browns in which they were bullied for much of the afternoon. Starting nose tackle
Steve McLendon, who is graded by PFF as the best defensive player on the roster thus far in 2014, suffered a shoulder injury in Cleveland and has already been ruled out of Monday's game.
7. A battle of the NFL's two best backs not named DeMarco Murray
If it weren't for DeMarco Murray being on a tear, we'd be looking at the two best backs in the league, at least in terms of yardage. Pittsburgh's Le'Veon Bell and Houston's Arian Foster lead the AFC with 542 and 513 rushing yards, respectively.
Among the 20 backs with at least 65 attempts, Bell is the only one averaging more than 5.0 yards per carry.
MOST YARDS PER ATTEMPT (MIN. 65 CARRIES)
RANK/PLAYERYPACARRIES
1. Le'Veon Bell5.2105
2. DeMarco Murray4.9159
3.
Chris Ivory4.988
4. Arian Foster4.8106
And Foster is one of only three backs with over 500 yards despite the fact he missed a game due to a hamstring injury and had only six yards on eight carries Week 4 against Buffalo. He and Murray are the only backs in football who have gone over 100 yards more than twice.
MOST 100-YARD GAMES, 2014
RANK/PLAYERTOTAL
1. Demarco Murray6
2. Arian Foster4
T-3. Le'Veon Bell2
Both the Steelers and Texans are giving up 4.4 yards per carry, which is 0.2 yards worse than the league average. Pittsburgh was gashed last week by
Isaiah Crowell and
Ben Tateand is now without McLendon up front. Houston was owned by Murray two weeks ago and rocked by
Rashad Jennings last month.
Watch for the Steelers to look to Bell in order to set up play-action and go deep, as well as to neutralize Watt. And watch for the Texans to use Foster often in order to take the heat off of Fitzpatrick and the passing game. Plus, it never hurts to control the pace on the road.
8. If Pittsburgh leads handily at halftime, don't call it an early night
It's simple. The Texans are awful starters and strong finishers. The Steelers are strong starters and awful finishers.
POINTS DIFFERENTIAL, 2014
TEAM1ST HALF2ND HALF
Steelers16-31
Texans-823
Plus, as we noted, the Steelers are vulnerable deep. And among 103 qualifying corners,
Cortez Allen is ranked by PFF as the worst cornerback in the NFL. In fact, despite that $5.2 million salary, Allen's been beat so often he's
being benched in favor of Brice McCain.
Point being, don't count Andre Johnson,
DeAndre Hopkins and the Texans out until the fat lady has sung, especially because they're likely to get some help from a defense that entered Week 7 with a league-leading 14 takeaways.
