Mazi Smith

Smith was born on June 16, 2001. He attended East Kentwood High School in Kentwood, Michigan. He was rated by ESPN as the No. 38 recruit in the Class of 2019 and the year's second best defensive tackle.^[1] He is of Nigerian descent.^[2]

During the 2021 season, Smith started all 14 games for Michigan. He had 37 tackles, two tackles-for-loss, four pass breakups, and four quarterback hurries.^[1]

In August 2022, Bruce Feldman of The Athletic rated Smith as the top-ranked player on his annual list of college football "freaks".^[3] Feldman cited Smith's size (over 325 pounds), speed (shuttle time of 4.41 seconds and three-cone drill time of 6.94 seconds), and his "rare power and agility". Feldman called Smith "so rare, in fact, it's hard to find the right superlative to begin with."^[4] He was also credited with being the vocal leader of Michigan's 2022 defense.^[5] At the end of the season, he was selected as a first-team player on the 2022 All-Big Ten Conference football team.^[6]

On October 7, 2022, Smith was stopped for speeding by police in Ann Arbor and was arrested after a gun was found in his possession without a concealed pistol license (CPL). Two months after his arrest, he was charged with carrying a concealed weapon, a felony. That count was dismissed on December 8, 2022, during a hearing as part of his guilty plea on the lesser charge of a loaded firearm in a motor vehicle.^[7]

Smith was selected in the first round (26th overall) of the 2023 NFL draft, which was the first defensive tackle taken by the Dallas Cowboys in the first round since Russell Maryland in 1991.^[10]

On November 4, 2025, the Cowboys traded Smith along with a 2026 second round pick and a conditional 2027 first round pick (higher of theirs or the Green Bay Packers) to the New York Jets in exchange for defensive tackle, Quinnen Williams.^[11][12]