Before the Pittsburgh Steelers’ Week 7 game against the New York Jets, Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin praised Jets defensive end Will McDonald for his impressive improvement in his second season. Tomlin mentioned that McDonald was one of his “two favorite rushers” from the 2023 draft class.
“They are an aggressive group that has a lot of top-quality players up front,” Tomlin said about the Jets’ defensive line. “I would be remiss if I didn’t talk about Will McDonald, a second-year player who is playing really well and showing game-wrecker characteristics.
We looked at him a lot during draft preparation when he came out. To be honest, my two favorite rushers in that draft were him and [Nick] Herbig. I’m not surprised that he is performing at this level.”
Pittsburgh picked Herbig in the fourth round of the 2023 NFL draft. In five games this season, Herbig has 2.5 sacks, one forced fumble, and one fumble recovery on just 79 pass-rush snaps.
The Jets chose McDonald with the 15th overall pick in the 2023 NFL draft. While he had a limited role as a rookie, playing only 184 defensive snaps, he showed his potential with 3.0 sacks, one forced fumble, and one fumble recovery on just 99 pass-rush snaps.
This season, McDonald’s playing time has gone up significantly due to injuries to Haason Reddick and Jermaine Johnson, who is out for the season with an Achilles injury. With 233 defensive snaps in six games, McDonald has already played nearly 50 more snaps than he did last season.
The Iowa State product has taken full advantage of his extra playing time, becoming the Jets’ most effective pass rusher in the first three games.
McDonald currently ranks second in the league with 7.0 sacks, just half a sack behind Aidan Hutchinson of the Detroit Lions, who suffered a season-ending injury last Sunday against the Dallas Cowboys.
If McDonald can climb to the top of the NFL sack leaderboard this Sunday, it would greatly help the Jets break their three-game losing streak.
He might have a good chance to do this against Steelers right tackle Broderick Jones, who has allowed five sacks this season, the most among right tackles.
In the 2023 draft, Jones was picked just before McDonald after Pittsburgh traded up with the New England Patriots. Jones was someone the Jets were rumored to be interested in, and Tomlin later suggested that the Patriots made the trade to prevent Jones from joining their division rivals.
