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After racking up eight catches for 169 yards and a touchdown, Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver DeVonta Smith revealed what might best be described as a team-first selfish attitude. The second-year receiver made some monster catches in the Eagles 24-8 win over the Commanders, then opened up about his mindset.
“My ball or nobody’s,” Smith said in his post-game press conference. The former Alabama star used the same quote twice, once referring to his overall mindset on balls that are up for grabs, then again describing his mindset on the final play of the first half, a 2-yard touchdown catch that came on a contested catch in the end zone.
“As a receiver that’s what it comes down to, 50-50 balls you’ve got to win it,” Smith explained in more detail. “I mean, the trust that Jalen [Hurts] has in all of the receivers, I mean, it’s our ball or nobody’s ball. So just being there with him, just being able to make sure that if we don’t come down with it, nobody comes down with it.”
Catches like that got Hurts to call Smith a “grown man,” after the game. They also led to fellow wide receiver A.J. Brown bringing out a Batman cape to drape over his shoulders.
“It kind of came out of nowhere, I didn’t even know they had it,” Smith said of the cape. Brown broke out the cape after cornerback Darius Slay nicknamed Brown, Smith, and Quez Watkins the three Batmans: Swole Batman, Skinny Batman, and Fast Batman, respectively.
Nick Sirianni Loves Unpredictability of Eagles Offense
Through three games, the Eagles have three different leading receivers. A.J. Brown dominated the season opener, racking up 10 catches for 155 yards against the Lions. Tight end Dallas Goedert topped the list the following week against the Vikings with 82 yards on five catches, and four different Eagles had 69 yards or more. This week it was DeVonta Smith’s 169 yards.
That makes the Eagles extremely difficult to defend.
“The more you can be where you’re unpredictable, the better, right?” said head coach Nick Sirianni during his post-game press conference. “So A.J. had the huge first game, DeVonta had the huge third game, they both had big time second games, and A.J. has really had big games throughout. Maybe not 150 yards, but he’s had 69 yards and then whatever he had today, what, 85 yards, so yeah that’s huge. Then you add Dallas Goedert, the passing game goes through those three guys.”
Quez Watkins Draws Big Penalties to Produce
If you just look at the box score, it looks like Quez Watkins didn’t do much at all for the Eagles against the Commanders, but if you watched the game or read the play-by-play, you’ll notice a pair of big plays the speedy receiver made.
“I thought Quez Watkins did a really nice job, I know he didn’t show up on the stat sheet, but he forced some [pass interference] calls that were chunk yardage,” Sirianni explained. “We count those as explosive plays, if you get a plus-16 yard chunk on a penalty, we’re going to count that, and he did that because of his speed out there.”
Watkins drew pass interference penalties of 23 and 17 yards, the second of which came on a drive that culminated in an Eagles touchdown. As far as Sirianni’s concerned, those plays count the same as if they’d been catches instead of penalties.
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