Until it happened, Alex Smith’s return to the roster felt more like a dream than a possibility.
His motivation and sheer willpower allowed him to not only pursue his career but also elevate the Washington Football Team to his first NFC East crown and postseason appearance since 2015. Before that, Smith was officially announced as the 2020 AP NFL Comeback Player of the Year on Saturday NFL Awards ceremony.
Smith won the award in a landslide, with 49 votes out of 50, while Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger got the only other vote.
In all likelihood, a simple gameday activation would have placed the 36-year-old among the top candidates for the award. But with every clearance he got on his way to recovering from his devastating leg injury in 2018, optimism about his ability to play grew again.
That hope was finally realized in week 5 when Smith replaced an injured Kyle Allen against the Rams. He completed nine passes for 37 yards and took six sacks in an eventual defeat. While his incredible return didn’t lead to victory that day, the simple fact that Smith was available and endured LA’s pass rush was nothing short of astonishing.
It would be four weeks before he saw more action, replacing an injured Allen again in a narrow loss to the Giants. Smith was named starter against the Lions the following week in a game that took place three days before the two-year anniversary of his leg injury. Smith registered 38 completes on 55 tries for 390 yards, all career heights, in a narrow defeat.
With Allen on IR, Ron Rivera Smith named the full-time starter. After beating the Bengals on Week 11, his first win since Week 9, 2018, Smith and his teammates destroyed the Cowboys on Thanksgiving. In week 13, as the world looked even closer than usual, Smith led Washington 4-7 to the unthinkable: a historic road win over the 11-0 Steelers. He threw for 296 yards and a score in the triumph.
A proper calf strain in week 14 limited Smith to close out the season, forcing him to miss two of the last three regular season games and a wildcard date against the Buccaneers. It will wonder how it could have turned out if he stayed healthy, but that makes little difference in light of what the veteran accomplished. In his six starts, Smith amassed 1,220 yards (68% completion rate), five TD and five picks.
Few who witnessed the events of November 18, 2018 could have foreseen what Smith was doing in 2020. In his 10th game with Washington, Smith sustained a spiral and compound fracture on his right shin and fibula. The scene brought back memories of the big franchise Joe Theismann, who suffered a broken leg on the same day in 1985.