When you see a safety KNOCK the paint off of a receivers helmet... you know they will have a good game. Cheers to you Eric Smith! I was skeptical when smith came in during the colts game, but since then he has really clicked with the defense and makes the middle of the field a life threatening place to be in. Many times during the Pats game i saw him level people out.. even on special teams! Him and pool are looking real good right now, and he really fits the system really well now. I see why the jets really love these "physical" safeties... with all the man to man coverage the jets play. they dont really need both safeties to play cover 2 over the top coverage. They can focus at least one safety to play in the box and be extremely disruptive, in both run and importantly mid field pass coverage. Eric smith looked like that type of guy in the past few games, I hope it continues.
I never lost respect for Smith. He always brings it. He had a big game yesterday. Next week, he'll knock Mendenhall into the next week. Guy has played up as an LB, back as a SS... versatile guy.
They even mentioned, with the exception of the pass interference play during our 45-3 loss, he has really played well. His hits was great and his recovery of the OSK sealed the victory. He also made some greta tackles.
I thought of Bart Scott's career-threatening quote to Welker when Smith tried to decapitate him a couple of times, I was like wow they really are trying to destroy him lol.
that last hit he landed on welker in which the entire stadium shook was crazy! can't believe welker just popped up as though nobody hit him. oh well, he is going home, we are kicking ass.
he completely disregards his own safety. Smith truly backed up Bart Scott's comment. he's the exact opposite of Sherry.
Loved the way Eric Smith played last night. He was just throwing his body with disregard every hit. He crushed Welker.
One of my fav plays from E. Smith is when he ran up to the line on that fake punt getting ready to truck stick somebody and Chung didn't know what to do and just botched the whole play. Beware of Eric Smith
That's like when u bust your ass outside and you are so embarrassed you jump back up so fast like nothing happened. Even though you're hurting inside. Lol
He will likely get fined for that hit, and a penallty wouldn't have had any impact on the game there, but Welker was playing with eyes on the back of his head for the rest of the game. Note: Smith is one of the most fundamentally sound, hard hitting, legal tacklers in the league. That was one of the few times I have seen him go helmet to helmet where it actually looked intentional.
Eric Smith is playing right now how I had expected him to play early in the season, in rotation with Pool. He's still not a good cover man, and he gets shaken out of his cleats on a passing decent juke, but he was around the ball all night and laid some solid hits. He'll certainly be paying a fine for the Welker hit, maybe the Jets need to give him a bonus?
