DeVonta Smith is a perfectionist. No matter the route, catch or juke, he is always striving to make sure he gets the maximum amount of yardage to ultimately help his Philadelphia Eagles win games.
So, when asked what one play he wishes he could change in Super Bowl LVII – a loss for the Eagles to the Kansas City Chiefs – Smith wasted no time answering the question.
"The last catch I had," Smith told Fox News Digital, as he looked way in what appeared to be a reflection of that very moment.
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It was the fourth quarter and the Eagles, who owned a 10-point lead at halftime, were trailing 35-27 to the Chiefs. As Jalen Hurts and the offense had been doing for most of the night, they were driving, and found themselves on the Chiefs’ 47-yard line with 5:46 left to go in the game.
In shotgun formation, Hurts dropped back and let Smith’s speed kick in down the left sideline before airing out a pass that found him wide open in Chiefs’ busted coverage.
Eagles fans have seen this play out numerous times; Smith uses his speed and route-running ability to leave his defenders in the dust and score a touchdown. In moments like this, when a defender is more than five yards away, it is a sure-fire touchdown.
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However, when Smith made the catch, he lost his footing down the sideline, and ultimately fell out of bounds at the two-yard line.
It was a play that set up a Hurts rushing touchdown on the next snap, and he ran it in again on the two-point conversion to tie the game.
The only problem was Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs had more than enough time to get their lead back, and Smith feels going out of bounds stole time away from his team in the end.
"If I went ahead and scored, we would’ve had more time when we had the ball on the last possession to go do some things that we needed to do," he said.
In typical Mahomes fashion, he led his Chiefs offense 66 yards on 12 plays that killed 5:07 of clock, bringing it down eight seconds left in the game where Harrison Butker’s 27-yard field goal secured the victory.
Of course, there was the controversial holding penalty by cornerback James Bradberry on Juju Smith-Schuster, which Bradberry admitted after the game was indeed a call referees should’ve made, that allowed the Chiefs better field position and the opportunity to burn more time off the clock.
Smith, who spoke to Fox News Digital on behalf of VRST, isn’t pointing any fingers at anyone but himself. That accountability is one of many great qualities about Smith that makes him a valuable piece of the Eagles – a piece that needed to perform well again this season if Philadelphia wants to get redemption.
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Despite the loss, Smith led the game with 100 receiving yards on seven receptions (nine targets). He wishes it said 102 yards with a touchdown, but for his first time in the biggest game in the NFL, it was one hell of a performance.
The Eagles are primed to make another run at the Vince Lombardi trophy in 2023, returning many key players and adding even more firepower on both sides of the ball.
At the same time, it is clear Philadelphia has a target on its back, knowing every team wants it to be their turn to win a Super Bowl instead of the Eagles getting another shot at it.
No one knows that more than Smith.
"Every year’s different. We can’t sit up here and bank on what we did," he said. "It’s a new year, new team. No team is ever the same the following year, so we have to put together things the right way and try to get back to where we was and finish it the right way.
"We have to build on what we did, continue to do things the right way. We do things how we did last year, and do it even better, I think we’ll get to where we want to be."
