DeMeco Ryans: T.J. Watt ‘Most Impactful Defensive Player’

PITTSBURGH — Houston Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans knows an awful lot about what good defensive football players look like. 

When he was a player with the Texans, he played with the likes of Mario Williams and J.J. Watt, who will enter the Texans Ring of Honor on Sunday. When he was a player with the Philadelphia Eagles, he suited up alongside Fletcher Cox and Brandon Graham. As a defensive coordinator with the San Francisco 49ers, he coached Arik Armstead and Nick Bosa.

Some of those players are gone from the league now, but many remain, and for Ryans, whose Texans face the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday, Steelers outside linebacker T.J. Watt is the best of the best.

“T.J., you can’t think of another guy who impacts the game more,” Ryans said this week leading up to his team’s game against the Steelers on Sunday.

“He’s probably the most impactful defensive player in the league right now. Leading the league in sacks and pressures. If you have one guy who can pressure, and disrupt the quarterback, it changes the entire scheme of things defensively. You don’t have to blitz as much because you have a guy like T.J. Watt. And when T.J. Watt gets help from a guy like Highsmith, it’s almost unfair. T.J. is impressive.”

Watt, the AFC Defensive Player of the Month, really showed his value in Week 3, while facing Las Vegas Raiders tackle Jermaine Eleumunor. He lit up Eleumunor for six pressures and two sacks on 29 pass rushes for a 20.7% pressure rate, according to NFL Next Gen Stats. Eluemunor had allowed just one pressure in his first two games and his 2.1% pressure rate was the lowest among right tackles in the first two weeks of the season.

Now, thanks to multiple injuries on the Houston offensive line, Watt and Alex Highsmith will be facing former sixth-round pick Austin Deculus, who is making his first start at one tackle slot. Veteran George Fant will man the other side.

“We have our hands full,” Ryans said. “We have a lot of new guys we’re shuffling in. We’ll do our best to try to slow those guys down a little bit.”