Cameron Jordan stirred the pot on a recent episode of “Games with Names,” and if you’re a Steelers fan, it was hard not to hear T.J. Watt’s name between the lines.
Jordan, speaking with Julian Edelman on the podcast, pushed back hard on the idea that sack totals should carry too much weight when people are deciding who belongs in the Defensive Player of the Year conversation. His point was blunt: production off the edge matters, but it should not be the only thing that gets celebrated.
“I think a sack is an overrated stat ... winning the game is the most important.
"We look at it like, 'oh he's the best because he had 19 or 20 or 22 sacks, but he's not worth a damn in the run. But we don't talk about it.
He's the DPOY but he's a liability on the outside zone stretch plays. He's the best, but he swims B gaps and C gaps."
Jordan never said a name, but the comment lands in a pretty obvious neighborhood. Recent Defensive Player of the Year winners include Myles Garrett in 2023 and 2025, Nick Bosa in 2022, and Watt in 2021. Before that, you have to go back to Khalil Mack in 2016 to find the next pass rusher to take the award.
If the target was Watt, the numbers from his 2021 season make the case a lot messier than Jordan’s broad critique suggests. Pro Football Focus gave Watt a 70.1 grade in run defense that year, and he finished with a grade below 60.0 in 15 of his games, a mark the source describes as average or poor.
The article also points to “stops,” defined as defensive plays that shut down the offense and leave the run going nowhere. Jordan had 43 stops in 16 games in 2021, while Watt had 42 in 15 games. On a per-game basis, Watt actually came out ahead.
That’s where the debate gets slippery. Jordan’s comments can be read as a shot at Watt, but they could just as easily be aimed at Garrett or Bosa instead. Still, because Watt is a recent DPOY winner, he’s automatically part of the conversation.
Jordan has long been one of the league’s most respected defenders, so the remarks carry weight. But if Watt was the intended target, it’s a strange one.
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