Smith is strong, we all knew… but he is stronger than I thought. And not by a little… by a lot. As a very young guy in his first game ever, he displayed more power than I thought I’d ever see a rookie show. It is incredible to see a 21 year old doing this week 1 of the season at a position he didn’t even practice at all through training camp.
He will be much stronger in year two, particularly since he’s coming from a small school like Tulsa. A year in an NFL training room, eating at their training table will do wonders for him… but wow, what will he be like then, because he’s doing things now that few can do.
Having worked at a meat-head gym all through college, I figured out that some guys are just strong for their size. Country strong, if you will. Some big guys can’t push nearly as much weight as you’d expect, and some little guys can do way more than you thought. What we have in Smith is a guy who is strong for his size. The difference for him is that he’s also a huge man with rare athleticism.
I guess when you have that combination, this is what you get:
And one of those tweets is from Geoff Schwartz, ex NFL OL. He just laughs at what Smith does to a guy, and says “Power. Finish. He just loads up and throws him”.
Anyway, Tyler just keeps surprising me… in a great way. We were lucky to get him.
