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| Photo by Darla Tamullitis, La Vita Loca Photography Copyright 2020, All Rights Reserved |
The biggest question and answer of the day came in the form of question two and the final one before the Zoom was concluded.
With two years left on your contract and no guaranteed money left, do you want to sign a contract extension this offseason?
"No, I don't think that's necessary. I fully understand and respect the situation that I'm in at the moment and what's happened in the past few years, so I'm not going to sit here and demand anything because I'm going out there to prove what I'm worth, and I believe that's the right situation for everybody. I think if I went back and asked for an extension, more money, anything right now, I think that would be the wrong move. I'm just going out there and trying to prove my worth and to help this team win games and do everything that I can to earn and make sure that these people know that I'm worth it."
This is what you expect from your leader and quite reminiscent of Jordan always playing out his contract and proving his worth each and every season.
How important is it for you to end you career with the Houston Texans?
“That would be, obviously, a goal of mine. This city has been incredible to me since the day I got here. I'm very thankful and fortunate to have the opportunity to play for such great fans that have been supportive of not only myself, my foundation and everything that I've tried to accomplish. It's a great place. I certainly hope that's the case. I don't know what's going to happen. I can't say what's going to happen in the future but I certainly hope that that's the case.”
Jordan never wanted to leave Chicago but the organization misunderstood what his greatness on and off the court meant to Chicago. Only time will tell if Houston learns from Chicago's mistake.
In between Watt also answered questions about Bill O'Brien, defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver, DJ Reader's absence in the locker room, potential TV career and time with family but maybe the most telling about his worth to the team came when he was asked about helping the rookies of 2020.
Has there been any advice you've been able to give the rookies with you going through the lockout your rookie year?
"Having gone through this type of offseason in 2011 where there were no OTA's, no minicamps, stuff like that, I do have a little bit of experience to lean on there. The thing that I've said is as long as you're training and doing what you need to do from a training standpoint, a running standpoint, getting yourself into the physical shape necessary for training camp, you'll be able to hit the ground running once training camp starts. This situation we actually have a little bit more of an advantage in that we have the Zoom meetings, we can go over the defense with the coaching staff. They can implement it and we can all talk to each other through that. So that is an advantage, but on the flip side of that, the disadvantage is it's hard for guys – in 2011 we could kind of meet as position groups or as an offense or defense, you could learn the plays and go over them and practice them together. Right now we're still kind of working through if that's entirely safe to do, if we should be gathering on our own, if we shouldn't, because we obviously want to get together. We prefer to work out together, we prefer to go over plays together, but at the same time we have to be smart about the guidelines and making sure that we're doing everything safe as well. We're kind of balancing those things just like everybody else, I think there's a lot of uncertainty and we're just trying to wade through those waters and make sure we do it right."
JJ Watt posed a refreshing insight into how much he is worth to the Texans organization and to the Houston community. As much as it appears Houston wants to work out a deal with quarterback DeShaun Watson, the organization needs to bring that same concerted effort to Watt sooner rather then later or he will walk.
