Macdonald added: “I’d love to brag on him more, but he’s tremendous… You’d be crazy not to try to make him the primary on as many concepts as you can. Maybe sometimes he’s on the backside of a concept and we can get to him.”
What makes what Smith-Njigba is doing even more impressive is that he’s being this productive while being double-teamed.
“He’s unguardable. It’s pretty amazing to see,” safety Nick Emmanwori said. “I’m sitting there thinking like, wow, this (is a) potential Hall of Famer. Great, great receiver. And knowing that he’s getting double teamed and they’re sending cloud his way and he’s still making plays, it’s crazy. It’s like you can’t even fathom it. So big ups to him. He’s one of one.”
And when he’s not being double-teamed, Smith-Njigba has the occasional one-on-one matchup, and he was able to take advantage of that on Sunday night. On a third-and-9 play in the second quarter, he was matched up with Chiefs cornerback Mansoor Delane and quarterback Sam Darnold recognized the single coverage and connected with Smith-Njigba for a 28-yard touchdown on perfectly thrown ball down the sideline.
“My eyes get big when I see [single coverage],” Smith-Njigba said. “I know if we have the chance to take a shot in man coverage, we’re going to take it. Always, always love my chances when I see that.”
Darnold added: “For the most part they had somebody over the top of Jax as well, if not even doubling him. Jax is a tough cover. He always will be. He’s a fun receiver to be able to throw the ball to.”
Later in the second quarter, Darnold and Smith-Njigba connected on a very similar play.
“It truly is a really hard thing to do to stay engaged through a whole game when the defense is trying to take you away,” receiver Cooper Kupp said. “But he’s done an unbelievable job with that and making the plays when the ball comes his way and doing some pretty cool stuff with it.”
Smith-Njigba became the first receiver since 1966 with at least 850 receiving yards and eight receiving touchdowns through the first seven games in a season, per ESPN. His 867 receiving yards are the third most through a team’s first seven games of a season in the Super Bowl Era, behind Tyreek Hill in 2023 (902) and Lance Alworth in 1968 (871), per NFL Research.