The NFL named Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson AFC Offensive Player of the Week Wednesday.
The third-year field general went 28-of-33 for 426 passing yards, five touchdowns, and posted a 158.3 passer rating, which is the mathematical perfect number in the passer rating formula. Furthermore, for the second time in his 28 career games, he did not sustain a single sack. The performance ensured that Watson became the first player in league history to throw for at least 400 yards and five touchdowns with five or fewer incompletions. Watson also joins Nick Foles and Jared Goff as the only quarterbacks since 1950 to throw for five touchdowns, 400-plus passing yards, and post a 158.3 passer rating.
Watson now has three career games with five-plus touchdown passes, the most in the NFL since 2015, and he is the only player to have at least five touchdown passes in a game in each season since entering the NFL as a first-round pick in 2017. The former Clemson Tiger is the sixth quarterback in league history to post five-plus touchdowns with zero interceptions. The other players are Drew Brees (seven), Tom Brady (six), Peyton Manning (five), Ben Roethlisberger (five) and Aaron Rodgers (four). However, Watson is the first player in NFL history to do it within his first 28 games.
Week 5 of 2019 is the 46th time a Texans player has earned a Player of the Week honor, and it is the third time this season a Houston player has won the award. The Texans have already matched last year’s total of player of the week honors with three. The most the Texans have won in a season is four back in 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2014.
Matt Schaub has the most player of the week honors for a quarterback in club history with four, just one ahead of Watson. Watson’s three player of the week honors are tied running back Arian Foster for the second-most by a Texans offensive player.
