Thursday morning on First Take, Dan Orlovsky had a horrific Joe Montana take that drew just criticism. Unfortunately, Stephen A. Smith wasn’t there to react.
After Tom Brady announced his retirement, Orlovsky listed his top five quarterbacks of all-time. Brady was number one, which is fine, but Joe Montana failed to crack Orlovsky’s list, which may have been a top five snub of all time.
Orlovsky was promptly chastised by Keyshawn Johnson for the brutal Montana slander, but the take still needed to be policed by Stephen A. Smith. Smith was back on First Take Friday morning and he relished the opportunity to eviscerate Orlovsky for his brutal list.
“Dan Orlovsky needs to be drug tested,” Smith said without hesitation. “He needs to be drug tested. Immediately. Something’s wrong with him. Something’s wrong with Dan Orlovsky.”
Perhaps just as bad as Orlovsky snubbing Montana from his top-five list, was Orlovsky’s reasoning for snubbing Montana from the list. “I’m 39,” Orlovsky said. “When Joe Montana was rolling, I was, like, six years old!”
But this list was supposed to be the best quarterbacks of “all-time,” not the best quarterbacks to play during Orlovsky’s peak football viewing years.
Stephen A. Smith responds to Dan Orlovsky’s disastrous top-5 QB list
“He needs to be drug tested” pic.twitter.com/JB7IazXOqa
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) February 3, 2023
“What the hell you mean you didn’t see Joe Montana?” Smith ranted on Friday. “Stop it! You can’t have a top-five list of quarterbacks in NFL history and don’t have Joe Montana on the damn list. That’s just ignorant! Now how the hell you didn’t see Joe Montana, but you saw John Elway? They ain’t that far apart!”
Desperate to figure out how it’s possible that a former NFL quarterback could slight Joe Montana in this manner, Smith contrived a reason as to why Orlovsky may have fumbled his list.
“He’s so damn cheap, he didn’t want to spend extra money on tape or extra money for an extra cable channel where he could watch some footage to see exactly what happened,” Smith concluded. “Cause there’s no way in hell he’s watched any football and he’s got a top-five quarterback list of all-time and it doesn’t include Joe Montana.”
Smith has repeatedly called Orlovsky cheap for flying coach and refusing to spend exorbitant amount of money on prime parking. Apparently that cheapness could also be the reason why a 39-year-old former quarterback never saw any film on Joe Montana.
Solid rant by Smith, but why wasn’t Orlovsky on First Take Friday morning to absorb this vitriol after issuing his terrible list? Maybe ESPN was too cheap to pay him for another show this week.
