The Reporter (Lansdale, PA)

Cowboys’ Smith nears returning to field

- By Schuyler Dixon

While there’s still plenty of caution, Cowboys LB Jaylon Smith just smiles and responds with “What do you think?” when asked if he’ll be ready for the season opener against the Giants.

OXNARD » Jaylon Smith found himself being greeted by Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones after the linebacker’s first day off at training camp, and following his first stretch of three consecutiv­e practices in about a year and a half.

Nobody has been more optimistic about Smith’s recovery from a devastatin­g knee injury in his final college game than Jones, the general manager who drafted the Notre Dame standout in the second round even though the Cowboys were almost certain he wouldn’t play in 2016.

Jones got another glimpse of the same Smith who stood out to coach Jason Garrett and the Dallas staff at the NFL combine 17 months earlier: smiling, upbeat, seemingly incapable of having a bad day in the face of an injury so severe there was no guarantee he would play again.

Now Smith has been through his first padded practice with the Cowboys. He anticipate­s his first preseason game, which he hopes is no more than a couple of weeks away.

And while there’s still plenty of caution, Smith just smiles and responds rhetorical­ly with “What do you think?” when asked if he’ll be ready for the season opener Sept. 10 against the New York Giants.

“It’s all about patience,” said Smith, who figured to be a top-five pick before tearing the anterior cruciate ligament and sustaining nerve damage in his left knee in the Fiesta Bowl against Ohio State on New Year’s Day 2016.

“But with sitting out a year, I learned so much about myself as a man. Like I said, everything I do is with a clear-eye view. It’s a focused vision, a determined belief and earned dream. So it’s something that I live by and I walk with every single day.”

The “vision ... belief ... dream” mantra turned up in Smith’s answer about every fifth question in frequent interviews through the first few days of camp. Everyone wants to talk to one of the more intriguing NFL players going into the season. And they want pictures and video of him going through drills.

After practice, they want to know whether there’s apprehensi­on about a foot brace that’s supposed to help him while the nerve continues to regenerate. Or what the next benchmark might be. Or when he started to believe he could make it all the way back.

 ?? TONY GUTIERREZ — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE ?? Cowboys linebacker Jaylon Smith was mostly hidden from view rehabbing a knee injury during his first training camp with the Dallas Cowboys a year ago.
TONY GUTIERREZ — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE Cowboys linebacker Jaylon Smith was mostly hidden from view rehabbing a knee injury during his first training camp with the Dallas Cowboys a year ago.

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