One gets the sense that Stephen A. Smith one day wants to end up in the Curt Gowdy wing of the Basketball Hall of Fame. He certainly seems to see himself as a figure that will live on through history, akin to a Grantland Rice, a Howard Cosell.
Yet if one were evaluating his contributions to the game of basketball, it would be difficult to identify those that were positive. Certainly, Smith and his tag team partner Skip Bayless contributed the rings-above-all mindset to the NBA and trashed multiple generations of stars along the way. Certainly, they have disparaged and demeaned, ranted and raged, all under the guise of ‘debate.’ What else?
Perhaps 20 years ago, Smith might have done some notable interviews with the game’s players, drawing out from them thoughts and feelings otherwise unexpressed. Perhaps 30 years ago, he might have written a few columns here and there that helped tell the story of the players, the teams, the league. Today, he makes threats — and faces — in a day job that more resembles his increasing cameos on soap operas and cop shows.
Smith has built his career almost exclusively off of his opinions about the NFL and NBA, but it is only on the latter that he is a regular part of the actual game coverage. He has never held any role on ESPN’s higher-rated NFL game programming (and one can infer whatever conclusion one would like about that fact). Thus he is primarily associated with the NBA.
The sports media is and has always been symbiotic, with media members creating their careers off of the leagues that they, in turn, helped promote. Smith’s relationship with the NBA, on the other hand, has been asymmetric.
He takes far more from the NBA than he has ever given; the only time he gives as good as he gets is when he is exchanging barbs with the league’s biggest stars. That includes just this week during the NBA Finals, when he made a point of diminishing Pacers G Tyrese Haliburton over a perceived slight. He went further earlier in the year, threatening to air dirty laundry of LeBron James and then making references to disputed claims about James’ attendance at Kobe Bryant’s 2020 memorial service — an insinuation for which he later apologized.
Smith’s threats are a particularly bizarre character trait. Whether Kevin Durant years ago or James earlier this season, Smith appears to believe he has something on these players — that his bully pulpit is one he can weaponize to not just criticize players when warranted, but to shame them; to harm their public standing, perceptions of their ability, and their careers.
However delusional, the intent merits some consideration. One of the faces of the NBA on television is someone who views his standing as a weapon to wage war against its players. To say the least, there is no other league that would allow someone like that on their air, and it is difficult to imagine any other organization — in sports, entertainment, politics or really any other form of business — allowing someone like that access to a national platform over which they theoretically have control.
To be clear, Smith never threatens to blow the whistle on corruption, to expose criminal behavior, to otherwise engage in what might be called journalism — but simply to embarrass. Even if his tools were more than just tossed-off rumor and innuendo, journalism done out of vengeance is not worthy of the word.
Why Smith — who worked his way up from the Philadelphia Inquirer to national ubiquity — would use his platform in such a fashion is a topic for another article, but make no mistake that it is a problem for the NBA.
After this season, Smith will leave his regular role on “NBA Countdown,” which will play second fiddle on ESPN to the TNT-produced “Inside the NBA.” While that will remedy some of the problem, Adam Silver would be wise to channel his predecessor David Stern, who per the 2011 Jim Miller and Tom Shales book “Those Guys Have All the Fun” consistently opposed Smith’s presence on ESPN’s NBA studio shows during the pundit’s first stint with the network.
Stern eventually won out and Smith was off of ESPN NBA coverage for more than a decade — until the network entrusted an overhaul of its NBA production to the executive in charge of “First Take,” David Roberts. In a wider (and ultimately botched) rebuild, Roberts brought in Smith as part of a transformation of ESPN’s NBA studio into a debate show outpost.
Smith likes to taunt that he’s ‘going nowhere,’ and that is true to an extent. It is almost impossible for an inflammatory TV personality to disappear from public life in a media system that prizes riling people up as an end in itself.
But that does not mean he has to have the valuable showcase of the NBA Finals.
The photo that went viral Friday of Smith playing solitaire during gameplay of Friday’s NBA Finals Game 4 may not necessarily be fair — as Bryan Curtis of The Ringer noted, he is surely not the first media member to play idly on the phone during a game — but it speaks to the sense that Smith really has no use for the game, except as a means by which to promote himself and exercise whatever power he believes he has. He seems far more animated by his various feuds, and his ability to shape perceptions of players, than by anything to do with the action between the lines.
Though Smith seems to be well-liked by the “Inside the NBA” crew, the hope here is that next season his provocations, insinuations and delusions of grandeur will be limited to “First Take,” rather than showcased during the biggest NBA games of the season. Smith has plenty of platforms to goad and inflame without having to do so in a cameo on “Inside.”
It is hard to explain why someone who believes he is bigger than the game — and seems to take pleasure in exercising the leverage he believes is afforded him by his platform — should then get to draft off of its popularity. If the NBA has benefited from having Smith as the face of its primary television broadcast, it is hard for this writer to see it.
