FRISCO, Texas – With their seventh and final selection in the 2026 NFL Draft, the Cowboys picked East Carolina wide receiver Anthony Smith.
Smith joins a packed wide receiver room in Dallas that includes CeeDee Lamb, George Pickens, Ryan Flournoy and KaVontae Turpin among others. It could be a tricky road to making the roster, but Smith has some good film from his college days and there's always a way to carve out a spot on special teams.
After four years at NC State, Smith transferred to the Pirates and had his two best seasons of college football, putting up 1,852 yards and 13 touchdowns on 105 catches.
Let's take a look at what Smith's tape shows he can do:
Straight-line speed steals the show
Probably the best element of Smith's game is his straight-line speed. Smith ran a 4.4 40-yard dash at his pro day, and the time shows up on film and is paired nicely with a 6'2" frame and 77" wingspan.
This first play sort of speaks for itself and is an exhibitor of that. The Tulane corner is playing eight yards off the line, and by the time Smith's route is around midfield, the corner still hasn't completely flipped his hips to run with Smith as he's anticipating a potential break or change of direction of some sort at the top of his route.
Since there wasn't one, Smith makes him pay by running right past him. Smith is able to get a good couple of yards on the corner, but the pass is pretty underthrown, so he's got to hold up a little bit and get under the football. Even with the defender getting the chance to catch up and sticking his arm into Smith's chest, he's able to hold on through the contact and come up with a big play for the offense.
Smith's leaping ability and body control
The track star speed is one thing for Smith, but some of his movements and ability to adjust his body in the air are fun to watch in certain areas of his tape as well, like on this play that's a simple out towards the sideline in the soft spot of zone coverage.
The cornerback that's initially over Smith appears to be responsible for the flat, which he goes and covers. So, Smith's route breaks towards the sideline about ten yards down the field into the soft spot of the coverage where the linebacker and safety can't get to him in time to make a play on the football.
The throw itself ends up being towards his inside shoulder instead of leading him out towards the sideline. Not ideal, but Smith gets up, contorts his entire body and come around to the football and ends up making the acrobatic catch. From there, he sees the incoming safety and goes down immediately. There are some instances where Smith does go down and try to get away from that kind of contact, which is a fairly smart decision given his lighter build.
Working the sideline and getting behind everybody
As we discussed on the first play, Smith's best ability is running past his opponents. He can run different routes, but he's at his best when he's being used as a vertical threat and asked to beat his defenders in a race.
That means you'll typically see him work the very outside of the field close to the sideline, like on this play. Smith does his job of getting behind both defenders with his speed (albeit off the camera angle here) and gets a good deal of separation behind everyone.
Unlike the first throw, this isn't underthrown and Smith can just reel it in and take off the rest of the way. If we're looking for something to critique, Smith bobbled the catch just a little bit and has had some troubles with drops over the last two seasons (9 total, including 6 in 2025). The good news for Smith is you can continue to improve your hands, but speed is something you can't teach.
