It has been 27 years since a defensive player has won the NFL’s MVP award, when New York Giants linebacker Lawrence Taylor was credited with 20 1/2 sacks in a season in which the Giants went 14-2 in the regular season and won the the Super Bowl.

This year, Texans defensive end J.J. Watt is making a case to follow in his footsteps.

In Thursday’s game against the Indianapolis Colts, Watt got two sacks, batted down three passes, hit the quarterback twice and hurried him two other times. Overall, Watt has pressured the quarterback 41 times, 19 more than the next defensive end playing in a 3-4 scheme (Washington’s Jason Hatcher).

He also had four tackles and scored a touchdown – his third of the season — on a fumble on Thursday. Of Watt’s three touchdowns, two are defensive, which gives him more defensive touchdowns than 27 teams in the NFL.

And it’s not that Watt is taking over games – he is flat out dominating them. Here is a chart from Advanced Football Analytics, which shows Total Win Probability Added (the difference between a team’s win probability at the start and the end of the play) and Total Expected Points Added(the difference between the expected points at the start and the end of the play) for defensive ends. The upper right hand corner means that player highly influences the game and individual drives.




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