Star Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker T.J. Watt has not hid his frustration regarding his team's postseason struggles—the Steelers haven't won a playoff game since 2016, which means neither has Watt in his eight seasons with the franchise—but he's still not looking to go chase rings somewhere else.
"I want to be a Pittsburgh Steeler. You guys know that," Watt said Monday, two days after the team's wild-card elimination at the hands of the Baltimore Ravens. "I don't want to leave this place. I want to be part of the solution. I've put so much into it here. ... I want to help Cam Heyward get to where we need to get. ... I love the people here and that goes beyond just the coaches. It's the fanbase, it's the people, the community, and we owe it to them to get it right."
#Steelers LB T.J. Watt doesn’t want to go play anywhere else.
— Aaron Becker (@Aaron_M_Becker) January 13, 2025
“I want to be a Pittsburgh Steeler. You guys know that. I don’t want to leave this place. I want to be part of the solution.” pic.twitter.com/oZhW98AEuG
But there is "a lot" to be fixed, the former Defensive Player of the Year added separately.
"Obviously I'm very frustrated with how things ended," he went on. "And that's not just with the last game, that's with the last month of football. It's a collection of things and it starts with myself. I need to play better, we need to play better. There's not one thing that needs to be fixed here, there's a lot of things. But it starts internally with myself. ... It'll be a long off-season to have to sit with that."
Watt, 30, is under contract in the Steel City through the end of the 2025 season, and the team will likely want to keep him on its roster so long as he's in the league. Luckily for the Pittsburgh front office and for Pittsburgh fans, the Pro Bowler seems to be aligned with that.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Steelers' T.J. Watt Clearly Defines Future in Pittsburgh Amid Playoff Frustrations.
