How Alex Smith’s Comeback Inspired Dak Prescott After His Devastating Ankle Injury

Dak Prescott's 2020 ankle injury left him facing one of the toughest recoveries of his NFL career. But another QB had already made him realise that an injury did not have to end everything. Alex Smith's comeback became a source of inspiration for Prescott after Smith returned to football following 17 surgeries on his injured leg.

Prescott was recovering from his own compound fracture and dislocation when Smith's comeback gave him a different way to look at the road ahead. The Cowboys QB later revealed exactly how Smith helped change his mindset.

Alex Smith Showed Dak Prescott What Was Still Possible

Smith's injury came nearly two years before Prescott's. On Nov. 18, 2018, Smith broke his right leg against the Houston Texans.  Prescott eventually underwent 17 surgeries over nearly two years before returning to Washington in 2020. He went on to win the AP Comeback Player of the Year award.

Prescott watched that comeback while dealing with his own injury. The difference was not just that Smith returned. He had returned from something Prescott viewed as even worse.

“I have to thank, honestly, Alex Smith,” Prescott said in March 2021. He explained that seeing Smith come back from a more serious injury changed his thinking immediately.

Prescott recalled the thought that went through his head after seeing Smith's recovery: “Hey, I can do this. I'm going to beat this.”

That was the part Prescott carried into his own rehabilitation. Smith did not need to speak to him directly or guide his recovery. His return had already provided the example Prescott needed.

In 2020, Smith admitted that simply getting back onto the practice field had once seemed almost impossible. 

The star QB said, “Certainly, the last few days, obviously have been really, really special. To dare to think about even practicing 670 days ago, whatever it was, to think about that back then, how scary that seemed and daunting as it seemed not only to attempt but even to put it out there and think about it, and then to finally lace up the cleats, to throw my jersey on again and put my helmet on and go out there was such a good feeling.”

“I have to thank Alex Smith. At that moment when you're sitting there and you have an injury like that...to see somebody who has already done it – and did it actually in worse circumstances, that allowed my mind to go ‘I can do this.'”

- Dak Prescott on his injury recovery pic.twitter.com/AITPUJ7JUD

— NFL on CBS ???? (@NFLonCBS) March 10, 2021

Prescott was now facing his own version of that uncertainty.

Dak Prescott Built His Comeback One Step At A Time

Prescott's recovery began with surgery, rehabilitation and a long wait before he could test the ankle in football movements again. Six months after the injury, he described the difference between throwing from a chair during rehab and finally dropping back on his own feet.

“Just spending the last few months throwing the ball from a chair, to actually be out there using my own two feet and slinging it around felt good,” Prescott told NFL Network.

By June 2021, Prescott was participating in Cowboys offseason work and testing the ankle in movements that once seemed out of reach. 

His remarkable return eventually reached its biggest test when he returned to the field for Dallas against the Buccaneers in the 2021 season opener, 333 days after his injury.

Smith's comeback gave Prescott the first picture of what a return could look like. Prescott then had to build his own version of it through rehabilitation, football work and finally an NFL game.