DeVonta Smith is a Heisman Trophy winner who caught 235 passes for 3,965 yards and 46 touchdowns at Alabama. A national title winner who played 37 college games and was never injured.

The only knock on him is his weight, and we went over this earlier in the week, before he was even drafted. At 6’1″, 166 pounds via the official combine measurements, he is small, and there are legit questions about his durability at the next level.

Rob Maaddi asked him about it Thursday night:

Q.Welcome to Philly. Before the draft throughout the whole process there was a lot that was made about your weight and size. How much do you weigh and what was going through your mind when that was being discussed? How can you overcome any of those negative perceptions? (Rob Maaddi)

DEVONTA SMITH: I don’t care too much about what people say about my weight. I understand reporters have a job. It’s their job to make a story. I just let them do their job. I can’t get mad at them for doing their job.

It’s not really the media’s “job to make a story.” Nobody is fabricating anything here. When you draft a guy who is smaller than said media members, you can ask the weight question without pushing any sort of agenda. The topic is 100% fair to broach.

For starters, there’s absolutely no way Smith played at 166 last year. He likely fluctuated in the 170-180 range, and that’s where he’ll be as an Eagle. They’ll get him in the gym and add a few pounds quite easily.

The thing about Smith is that he’s tall, so he has a physical frame that can handle more weight. He’ll “fill out,” in a sense. There is more body mass to cover with muscle definition. It may look different, because people who have longer limbs, like Smith, might not have the same amount of definition as someone smaller, stockier, and with a more compact type of build.

With arms measuring at 31 and one-eighth of an inch, he’s always going to look very lean. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t strength there, and you see it with that great jab move he uses to get off the line:

He uses those arms to separate, keep corners off balance, and give himself space to operate.

Seriously, though, look at how ripped and defined his arms are, even though he’s a lean guy:

(Kyle Robertson- USA Today Sports)

Here’s a relevant blurb I pulled from Muscle and Fitness, to explain it better:

Height isn’t necessarily advantageous for bodybuilders. Added vertical inches means more muscle mass is required to fill out the frame. Arms can prove particularly challenging, especially if they’re long and lean. Along with added real estate to fill up, long arms can affect biomechanics and the amount of weight one can handle through that elongated range of motion.

That last sentence is another way to say that guys with long arms can’t bench press for shit, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t strong. It just means the motion is harder for them to complete, because it’s a little janky and funky. Whereas guys like Smith and Kevin Durant are never going to be benching machines, they’ll excel in other areas where shorties won’t.

Here’s another way to explain it, this one via a site called “Art of Tall” – 

Tall people have much more surface area to fill. It’s no secret that tall people have proportionally longer arms, legs and torsos compared to shorter people. This is why when you stand two people side-by-side who are 5’6 and 6’6 and add 20 kg onto them the shorter person will always look more muscular and “built”. Let’s say you add 2 kg of muscle to your arms. A short person may have an arm length of 90 cm while a tall persons arm length is 140 cm. The 2 kg will be much more densely packed on the shorter arm while for the longer arm it will be stretched out and less noticeable.

….

A shorter person will reach the state of appearing well built much faster than a tall person BUT after a while there won’t be any more room for growth naturally because of their small frame. As a tall person your larger limbs will give you much, much more room to grow and develop.

That’s the silver lining here.

And the good thing is that DeVonta Smith is not a bodybuilder, he’s a receiver. He produced at an elite level in college. If he was 5’9″, and 166 pounds, you’d be more concerned. But he’s got the type of frame to bulk up slightly without losing any of that elusiveness and explosiveness that made him so good in Tuscaloosa.