The NFL is slowly but surely unveiling its top 100 players. However, Pete Prisco took a different approach with his top-100 players list for CBS Sports. He didn’t drag it out, rolling the whole thing out at once. Only two Pittsburgh Steelers made the list, though. Cam Heyward landed at 39th, and T.J. Watt was ranked 88th. While Watt is coming off a down year, analyst Emory Hunt still thinks he should’ve been higher on Prisco’s list.
“T.J. Watt at 88 really concerns me,” Hunt said recently on CBS Sports HQ. “Because I feel like he’s still a better player than Trey Hendrickson… Why is T.J. Watt so far down? We think about Watt and what he does from a timing perspective. When you think about the Steelers’ defense, ‘They need to make a big play right here,’ Watt is usually making this play.
“Eight pass breakups, three forced fumbles, 10 TFLs. Seven sacks this year is down. I know the sack number is what everybody focuses on, but the impactful plays Watt makes on a consistent basis in the most important time of a game. He should easily be higher than that.”
Prisco ranked Watt 11th on his 2025 edition of the list. Watt was also coming off a down season then, slowing down in 2024 compared to his dominant 2023. Still, he didn’t fall too far in Prisco’s eyes.
However, another underwhelming season was enough to drop Watt more than 70 spots. It feels odd seeing Watt almost falling out of the top 100. While 88th might be too low, Watt didn’t look like one of the NFL’s premier players last season.
Watt still made some big plays, as Hunt said, but fewer than he’s made in the past. Even in 2024, when he finished with only 11.5 sacks, Watt still led the league with six forced fumbles. Compare that to 2025, when Watt had three forced fumbles to go along with his decreased sack production.
Yes, you could blame some of Watt’s lack of production on his freak-accident injury that forced him to miss three games. However, he wasn’t as dominant before that. He had issues before that injury happened.
Still, that doesn’t totally justify Watt’s placement on Prisco’s list. Hunt is right to compare him to Hendrickson. He’s also one of the NFL’s top pass rushers, but he had a worse season than Watt last year. Hendrickson only played in seven games due to injury, posting four sacks and one forced fumble.
Despite that, Prisco placed Hendrickson at 67th on his list. That leaves a pretty big gap between him and Watt, despite Watt’s better 2025 season. It’s not like Hendrickson is significantly younger than Watt, as both will turn 32 this season.
We’ll see if Watt proves Prisco and his other doubters wrong this season. Perhaps the Steelers’ new defensive system will be just what Watt needs to spark his game again. The Steelers need him to be better than he was last year.
