A true legend amongst men. After 12 years with the Arizona Cardinals and the Houston Texans, J.J. Watt is going to retire after the end of the regular season, finishing one of the greatest defensive careers in NFL history.
To say that J.J. Watt is a legend is to underplay how great of a player the former Houston Texans icon was during his glory days. All the way back in the early 2010’s (feels like a lifetime ago now, right), there wasn’t a more feared player in all of the league than Houston’s #99.
Not Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, Ben Roethlisberger, Marshawn Lynch, LeSean McCoy, Adrian Peterson, Antonio Brown, Larry Fitzgerald, Rob Gronkowski, Travis Kelce, Aaron Donald, Von Miller, Ndamukong Suh, Bobby Wagner, Darrelle Revis, Patrick Peterson, Earl Thomas, Richard Sherman, Cordarrelle Paterson, or Devin Hester, all members of the 2010’s All-Decade team were more feared than J.J. Watt in his prime.
The man was just as dominating as the great Lawrence Taylor but was far more physically intimidating coming at offensive tackles from all over the line of scrimmage with his 6′ 5” height and 288 lbs. weight. J.J. Watt was one of the only players I’ve seen that teams have had to put triple teams on him in order to just slow him down, which is saying a lot about his tenacity to sack a quarterback.
Simply put, prime J.J. Watt is the most terrifying player to have played the game in the last twenty years, despite the numerous and unfortunate injuries that he has suffered.
Pretty impressive, right? Well, that’s only a quarter of how great J.J. Watt was as his stats are just as terror-inducing to offenses as his presence.
In 149 career games played, J.J. Watt currently has 111.5 sacks, 531 tackles, 2 interceptions, 191 tackles for loss, 313 quarterback hits, 27 forced fumbles, 6 touchdowns, and 17 fumble recoveries, even though the man has missed more time than probably any great defensive player in NFL history.
Seriously, J.J. Watt would have the greatest defensive career ever if it wasn’t for the multiple back surgeries, a tibial fracture in 2017, chest pectoral tear, a shoulder labrum tear, an arm bicep tear, shoulder rotator cuff tear, a shoulder dislocation (all occurred in back-to-back seasons of one another), and the heart arrhythmia he suffered this season prior to the Cardinals Week 4 win over the Panthers.
Seeing how Watt started out his career with two 20+ sack seasons and 76 sacks in 83 games, it isn’t hard to believe that a fully healthy Watt would have broken Bruce Smith’s all-time sack record of 200 a few years ago. I mean, he was nearly halfway there only six years into his career and has played an additional six seasons since.
Nevertheless, all of these injuries still couldn’t keep Watt from raking in numerous awards as he is a 3X NFL’s Defensive Player of the Year (T-most in NFL history), he has made 5 1st Team All-Pro, 5 Pro-Bowls, a Walter Payton Man of the Year award winner, he came in 2nd in MVP voting in 2014, and 2nd in the Comeback Player of the Year voting in 2018.
J.J. Watt is a 1st ballot Hall of Famer and has been for a long time. Yet, that’s not what makes him so great.
No, what makes him so great is his dedication to the communities he plays for and represents. There aren’t many players in NFL history, let alone the modern-day league, that have given back as much money, time, resources, help, etc. to the local communities to the player represents than Watt.
Just as one example, J.J. Watt went out of his way and established a charity to help the flood victims of Houston from the devastating effects of Hurricane Harvey back in 2018. Now, most players give money to local charities and food banks, which is an admirable thing by itself.
But very few did what Watt achieved with the Hurricane Harvey victims as he helped raise a staggering $41.6M dollars for the relief effort, far surpassing what was expected or even socially required of the former Houston Texan.
That’s why I view J.J. Watt as one of the greatest football players to have ever lived. In the face of tragedy and loss, J.J. Watt stayed true to himself and his values and in doing so created one of the greatest NFL defensive careers (both on and off the field) in living memory.
I hope Watt asks to be cut from Arizona so he can sign with one of the playoff teams (the 49ers, preferably) and get one last chance at a ring. But, if he does decide to see his time out as a Cardinal, he has more than earned it.
Have a great retirement J.J., you truly deserve it.
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