Aaron Rodgers isn’t the only future Hall of Famer not present for Steelers OTAs.
Linebacker T.J. Watt isn’t there, either.
Watt is due for a new contract. He has yet to get one. And he’s making the clearest possible statement regarding his feelings on the matter.
Watt, without a new contract, will make $21.05 million this year, the last one of his current contract. The new-money average on the deal was $28 million, a record when it was signed. The top of the market has now passed $40 million per year, thanks to Browns defensive end Myles Garrett.
T.J. Watt hasn’t said much about the situation, beyond posting an image last month of himself flashing the peace sign. Which the kids (and the olds) recognize as a farewell gesture.
Appearing Wednesday with Pat McAfee and company, T.J. Watt’s brother, J.J., declined to address the situation.
“I have a lot of information on that subject,” J.J. said. “I just — that’s not my subject.”
J.J. nevertheless shared some general thoughts that potentially become relevant to T.J.'s contractual conundrum.
“Ownership and front offices obviously treat this like a business,” J.J. Watt said, “but they do not like it when the players flip the script on them and treat it like a business back.”
He’s absolutely right. Teams always do what’s in their “best interests.” If the player dares to do the same, he’s branded as selfish and greedy and “not a team player.”
J.J. also believes there’s value in getting deals done sooner than later.
“Taking care of your guys earlier does a few things for you,” J.J. said. “Number one, it gets them locked in at a lower price, in the long run. I mean, you look at what prices are doing every single year, you get them locked in at a lower price. Number two, you’re keeping them happy, because even now — let’s say look at Trey Hendrickson situation — let’s say they pay him now. Now there’s all this resentment, there’s all this animosity, and, yeah, 40 million dollars or whatever it is cures a whole lot of that, and he’s gonna act like everything is great and everything is wonderful. But you just went through a whole bunch of time where there was some disrespect, where there was some hurt feelings, and now you’re gonna go back into a building and act like everything’s OK.
“If you take care of things early, especially when players want to take care of things earlier and say that they’ll take less money to take care of things earlier because it sets themselves up long term financially, do that. Because if you don’t do that, that’s when the problems start to arise, and now all of a sudden you say, ‘Hey, we have to kick this can down the road because of the way everything’s working out.’ You kick the can down the road, the can gets a whole lot bigger. And then the player says, ‘Well, the can’s a lot bigger now. Fill it up.’ And you don’t want to fill it up because you say, ‘Well, we have to pay all these other guys, We have to take care of these other things.’ It’s like, ‘Well, I wanted to fill the can way back down here when it was a little soup can. Now we got ourselves a garbage pail.’”
The last time around, T.J. Watt showed up and held in for training camp and the preseason before getting his deal. This time around, the market has spiked since the end of the 2024 season. It will be more expensive to extend T.J. Watt than it would have been last year, or even earlier this year.
Then there’s the reality that, for the first time ever, the Steelers have given a market-level deal to a player who has never played for the Steelers. If DK Metcalf can get that kind of contract with no history of loyal service to the black and gold, T.J. Watt has every right to expect a deal that puts him past Garrett as the highest-paid defensive player in the league.
