Former Ohio State football wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njiba felt disrespected when he received the 2025 Defensive Player of “theyear” award.
On May 18, Smith-Njigba revealed on his social media that he received a trophy mistakenly labeled for a defensive award. The trophy also had a grammatical typo; there was no space in between “the” and “year” in the description.
”Nah, I really want to expose them, though,” Smith-Njigba said on his Instagram story. “It’s getting disrespectful, guys.”
Smith then pointed out both mistakes on the award’s description.
“Just keep the award at this point,” Smith-Njigba wrote in a separate post. “Leave it in the history books.”
Smith-Njigba had 119 receptions for 1,793 receiving yards and 10 touchdowns in his third NFL season. With 54.4% of the vote share, Smith-Njigba beat San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey for the AP Offensive Player of the Year award.
Smith-Njigba also won Super Bowl LX with the Seahawks.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Former OSU WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba calls NFL award mistake disrespectful
Reporting by Dan Aulbach, Columbus Dispatch / The Columbus Dispatch
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
