Jaxon Smith-Njigba’s OPOY Trophy Is the Latest Embarrassing Mistake the NFL Has Made With Its Star Receiver
The NFL had one job. Put the right words on the trophy. They could not get it done.
Jaxon Smith-Njigba, the 2025 Offensive Player of the Year, posted a video to his Instagram showing the trophy the league finally delivered to him. The inscription read “2025 Defensive Player of the Year.” Not offensive. Defensive. On the trophy. For the wide receiver who led the league in receiving yards.
It got worse. “Offensive” was misspelled as “Oefensive” elsewhere on the engraving. There was no space between “the Year.” This was not one typo. This was a parade of typos on a single piece of metal that was supposed to honor the most productive offensive player in football.
“It’s getting disrespectful, guys,” Smith-Njigba said in the video.
He’s not wrong.
This Is a Pattern, Not an Accident
The NFL Honors ceremony in February was where this whole thing started. Comedian Druski was on stage as a presenter and mispronounced Smith-Njigba’s name when announcing him as the winner. The Seahawks receiver smiled through it because that’s what professionals do, but everyone watching at home cringed.
The league sent the trophy out months later. They had every minute of that wait to confirm the engraving. To put it in front of a single human being who could read the words “Defensive Player of the Year” on an offensive award and stop the shipment. Nobody did.
NFL spokesperson Brian McCarthy told The Athletic that Smith-Njigba will receive a new trophy and the league is creating and shipping a replacement. The statement from the league said “We sincerely apologize to Jaxon for the error.” That’s the right move. It’s also two steps too late.
The Larger Issue
Smith-Njigba had a season that would have built any other player’s brand into the stratosphere. He led the NFL in receiving yards. He was the best wide receiver in football. He carried a Seahawks offense that had questions at quarterback and managed to outshine every other pass catcher in the league.
The reward was a botched name pronunciation on stage and a trophy that called him a defensive player.
There’s a real conversation happening about how the league markets its non-quarterback stars. Skill players who aren’t named Travis Kelce or Patrick Mahomes or Saquon Barkley tend to get pushed into the background. JSN’s situation is the most visible recent example of how that disconnect plays out in real time.
What Happens Now
A replacement trophy is on the way. The NFL will swallow the embarrassment and move on. Smith-Njigba will keep doing what he does, which is catch passes and tell anyone who’ll listen that he’s hungry to do it again in 2026.
The new Seahawks offense should give him every chance to repeat as OPOY. Seattle has built around him in a way that suggests they understand his value, even if the league office can’t get a trophy right.
If JSN wins it again, the smart play would be for the NFL to engrave the new one before the ceremony even happens. Send him an extra one for the trouble. Maybe even let him pick the font.
This is not the kind of thing that ruins a player’s relationship with the league forever. But it’s the kind of thing that should not happen to anyone, much less the reigning best offensive player in the sport. The NFL needs to do better than “Oefensive.”
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
