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NFL insider makes wild claim about Seahawks WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba's record pace 1
September 28, 2026 Featured, NFL
Jaxon Smith-Njigba has 405 receiving yards through three games, and NFL insider Jordan Schultz posted after Sunday’s games that the pace puts the Seattle Seahawks receiver on track for 2,295 yards across a 17-game season. That works out to 135 yards a game, and Schultz said he double-checked the figure before sharing it.
Smith-Njigba had 122 yards in the opener against New England, a game Sam Darnold left early with a glute injury. Drew Lock was throwing to him in Week 2 when he caught nine passes for 155 yards and three touchdowns against Arizona, including an 82-yard score on the opening possession. Darnold returned on Sunday, and Smith-Njigba caught 10 passes for 128 yards and two touchdowns in a 33-31 loss to Washington.
Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-NjigbaSeattle Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba
Feb 5, 2026; San Jose, CA, USA; Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba (11) talks to media members at the San Jose Marriott. Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images
Seattle played most of two games without its starting quarterback, and Smith-Njigba averaged 138.5 yards across those two weeks. That ties the volume to the receiver far more than to whoever happens to be throwing.
Calvin Johnson’s 1,964 yards in 2012 remain the single-season record, and his 122.8 yards per game that year also stand as the league mark. The per-game figure is the fairer comparison, since Johnson played a 16-game schedule, and Smith-Njigba is currently more than 12 yards a game above it. His league-leading 1,793 yards last season came at a slower clip, and three games is a small sample to project across 17, though he has cleared 120 yards in every outing so far.
Schultz went a step further than the record in the same post.
“Translation: JSN belongs in the MVP conversation,” Schultz wrote.
I had to make sure this was correct, because it’s that wild: Jaxon Smith-Njigba is on a record pace that the NFL has never before seen — 2,295 receiving yards is his current trajectory.
Translation: JSN belongs in the MVP conversation 🗣️🗣️ pic.twitter.com/uDlUim2xUW
— Jordan Schultz (@Schultz_Report) September 28, 2026
Can a wide receiver actually win MVP?
No wide receiver has ever won the AP MVP award, including in the two biggest receiving-yardage seasons in league history. Johnson’s 1,964-yard season drew no MVP votes. Cooper Kupp won the receiving triple crown in 2021, leading the league in catches, yards and touchdowns on the way to 1,947 yards, and got one vote.
Johnson’s Detroit teammate, Nate Burleson, pointed to the standings during that 2012 season. “If we were winning, say we got to the playoffs, he would definitely be in the conversation,” Burleson said on NFL AM. Kupp’s Rams then won the Super Bowl in his triple-crown year, and the ballots stayed with the quarterbacks anyway.
Smith-Njigba’s own 2025 season followed the same pattern. It earned him AP Offensive Player of the Year with 14 first-place votes, while the MVP race was a two-quarterback fight that Matthew Stafford won over Drake Maye by 24 first-place votes to 23. Voters treat the offensive award as the ceiling for a receiver, and they have held that line through seasons that looked unbeatable at the time.
Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-NjigbaSeattle Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba
Feb 4, 2026; San Jose, CA, USA; Seattle Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba (11) speaks to the media at the San Jose Convention Center. Mandatory Credit: Cary Edmondson-Imagn Images
Schultz’s argument runs into that history, and the size of Smith-Njigba’s final number is the one lever it has.
Breaking 1,964 by a handful of yards would place him alongside Johnson and Kupp, with a historic receiving season that MVP voters admired and set aside. Finishing several hundred yards past it would hand voters a season nobody at the position has produced, with no precedent telling them where to file it.
The record itself looks well within reach. Smith-Njigba needs 1,560 more yards over Seattle’s final 14 games to pass Johnson, an average of 111.4 per game, which is lower than anything he has posted this season.