Madden 24 dropped their edge rusher rankings and Steelers pass rusher T.J. Watt was not the highest rated player. In fact, he fell a few spots from last season, when he was rated the second best edge rusher in the game behind only Myles Garrett over Cleveland.
This year, Watt is tied for fourth overall in the edge rusher rankings, sitting behind Garrett, Nick Bosa, and Micah Parsons. He boasts the same rating overall as Von Miller and Maxx Crosby, but is still the highest rated player on the Steelers, ekeing out both Minkah Fitzpatrick and Cam Heyward.
However, teammate Alex Highsmith received a sharp boost. Only a 75 overall in last year’s game, he hopped all the way up to an 82 overall after registering a 14.5 sack season with the team. That gives the Steelers one of the better edge rusher dups in the entire game to work with.
In the edge rusher room, some other notable rankings did not go as well, as EA is not a fan of Markus Golden, DeMarvin Leal or Quincy Roche. Golden is the highest rated backup at 73 overall. Curiously, it appears that Nick Herbig is listed with the off-ball linebackers, though he did not play there in OTAs or minicamp.
| T.J. Watt – 94 overall |
| Alex Highsmith – 82 overall |
| Markus Golden – 73 overall |
| Quincy Roche – 67 overall |
| DeMarvin Leal – 66 overall |
Most of these are pretty fair ratings. It can be argued to bump up Golden a little bit. That one the might feel a little low. But other than that, it’s hard to argue most of these ratings. Herbig should be included in this group, although the long-term projection would have him as an off-ball linebacker, so I understand why he is with that group. The defensive line ratings were revealed as well, with Cam Heyward coming in as one of the better defensive lineman in the game.
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