Inside The Star
A Dallas Cowboys player in his third year will have a breakout season and eliminate the bust status he is currently developing.
The Cowboys are known for drafting well, but defensive tackle is one position that is tough to evaluate in the first two years. Mazi Smith will prove his doubters wrong this season.
Mazi Smith has had a tough time keeping up with the NFL’s speed, which is evident in his career’s production so far.
This article will examine Mazi Smith and the production of other defensive tackles to see when they started coming into their own.
The defensive tackles mentioned alongside Mazi Smith later in the article will all be over 320 pounds. This should show similar production to other one-technique defensive tackles.
Mazi Smith was drafted in the first round of the 2023 NFL Draft with the 27th pick.
When Mazi Smith was drafted, he weighed 337 pounds, and Lance Zierlein’s overview from NFL.com said,
Dontari Poe might be the physical and athletic player comparison for Smith, but more consistency from Smith is needed before he finds the Pro Bowl, as Poe did twice in his career. Smith’s blend of size and quickness is rare. He can punch and control a base block with relative ease. However, he struggles to match the initial movement of move blockers, which diminishes his effectiveness. He has space-eating potential but needs to become more consistent at taking on double teams and securing his gap. Smith’s size and testing could give his draft slotting some juice but he’s more of a Day 2 talent with exciting upside than a plug-and-play starter.
Dontario Poe is some pretty big shoes to fill and to this point Mazi Smith has not lived up to that title.
One of the issues could be the lack of consistency on the defensive coaching staff.
Dan Quinn called the defense in his first year with the Cowboys and had Mazi Smith drop weight. Reports said Smith lost approximately 30 pounds.
Why would a coaching staff finally draft a one-technique defensive tackle and have him drop 30 pounds? No one knew the answer to this question.
This caused Smith to struggle to get off blocks in his rookie year and to be overmatched in one-on-one situations.
According to PFF.com, these were his grades for the 2023 and 2024 seasons:
These grades are not promising, but two differing defensive schemes could have stunted his defensive growth.
Losing 30 pounds in one year and regaining weight the next year could have also hurt him, as he had to become re-accustomed to the weight.
These grades should increase in year three, but let’s look at three other first-round one-technique defensive tackles and see if their grades increase after a few years.
Year 3️⃣ Mazi Smith will look like a totally different player.
As I and many others continually preach, it almost always takes a DT 3 years to fully develop in the...
