What happened to retired NFL quarterback Alex Smith’s leg?

Retired NFL quarterback Alex Smith suffered a catastrophic leg injury in the 2018 season. And NFL reporter Dov Kleinman recently shared a shocking picture on X of what Smith’s leg looked like years later, after Smith’s leg-repair surgery, and then still further surgeries Smith underwent to treat a life-threatening infection.

Smith’s injury happened in the third quarter of a game against the Houston Texans. Smith played quarterback for the Washington Redskins (now the Commanders) and was sacked, breaking both the tibia and the fibula in his right leg. The injury recalled Joe Theismann’s 1985 career-ending injury, the football legend wrote on X (then Twitter). “Alex’s leg is exactly like mine 33 yrs ago,” Theismann said. “Prayers for my guy man! You will bounce back!” Patrick Mahomes, Smith’s former Kansas City Chiefs teammate, also tweeted.

“You just never expect something like that’s going to happen to you. To look down and see your leg bending where it shouldn’t. The realization that obviously my leg was pretty severely broken,” Smith told Plasticsurgery.org years later. Doctors repaired Smith’s leg, but the compound fracture was just the beginning of the athlete’s health problems that year.

What kind of infection did Alex Smith have?

Days after Alex Smith’s gruesome injury, his fever spiked in the hospital, and doctors rushed to find out what was wrong with him. As Smith drifted in and out of consciousness, doctors ran their tests, as the University of Utah graduate’s blood pressure dropped, suspecting a blood clot or possible pulmonary embolism. They finally determined Smith had an infection. “He’s septic,” Smith’s wife, Elizabeth Smith, later wrote for ESPN recalling the ordeal. “It’s in his blood. But we don’t know what type of infection it is,” doctors told her.

Smith’s infection was necrotizing fasciitis, otherwise known as flesh-eating bacteria. Smith’s life and leg were saved in a series of emergency surgeries as large portions of muscle and skin were removed to stop the infection, leaving the bone exposed. With the bacteria under control, the question remained: Would Smith’s leg need to be amputated?

How long did Alex Smith play after his injury?

Plastic surgeons took muscle, fat, skin, and tissue from Alex Smith’s thigh to save Smith’s right leg, devastated by the compound fracture and the surgeries required to treat the bacterial infection, and it worked. All combined, Smith had a total of 17 surgeries in nine months. Wearing an external fixation device for a year, Smith was out for the 2019 NFL season but returned in Week 5 the next year when Washington starter Kyle Allen left the game injured. Smith played several more games helping Washington reach the playoffs, earning Smith the Comeback Player of the Year award that season.

Washington waived Smith in 2021, but despite interest from other teams, Smith retired. NFL insider Dov Kleinman captioned the picture of Smith’s leg, “Alex Smith’s leg 6 years after he shattered his tibia and fibula.” A comment responded, “They should rename the comeback player award the Alex Smith Comeback Player of the Year.”