Stephen A. Smith warned us all what was coming. He hyped the Wednesday edition of his podcast, The Stephen A. Smith Show, as an all-timer as he promised to unleash everything he had stored up over several years on former ESPN colleague Jason Whitlock. And he delivered.
The First Take host went on a 40-minute rant for the ages where he cursed out Whitlock repeatedly, told behind-the-scenes stories from their time working together, and described him as a pariah in the sports media industry. And when Smith was finally finished, he offered apologies to ESPN, his staff, his family, and many others whose name he mentioned in the episode. But not before he unleashed a shocking fire and brimstone onslaught that was one of the most brutal verbal takedowns in human history.
In case you’re wondering, the timing of this stems from Whitlock’s accusations that Smith really didn’t write his autobiography. Smith responded briefly on First Take, not mentioning Whitlock by name, but that’s what his independent podcast is for, right?
Smith’s entire podcast episode can be found here. But in case you don’t want to listen to a 40-minute takedown on one individual and invite all of that negative energy into your life, here are the wildest quotes and takeaways from Smith’s podcast on Whitlock.
1) “I literally called my pastor and asked for his forgiveness and understanding in advance, because he’s not going to recognize the person he’s about to hear. I did the same when I emailed the bosses at ESPN.”
It’s good that SAS got clearance from both secular and religious powers to move forward with his Whitlock diatribe. Although I’m not sure either would really approve of how many times Smith called Whitlock a “piece of shit” or “fat bastard.”
2) “While you were on Blaze TV spewing that bullshit to people, did you tell them that? Did you tell them how you stood outside of First Take begging me to talk to you? Did you tell them that once this same article in Deadspin came out, weeks later you wrote a lengthy apology to me in an e-mail begging me to forgive you? Pointing out how you were betrayed by this particular writer so you know how I must feel that you betrayed me? Did you tell the folks that? You bitch. Did you tell them? You fat piece of shit.”
Stephen A Smith just smoked Whitlock lmfaoooo pic.twitter.com/htdgr9Z4iI
— Ant (@guap_ant) January 11, 2024
Stephen A. revisited a famous Deadspin article by Greg Howard from 2015 that chronicled Whitlock’s disastrous tenure in charge of The Undefeated at ESPN. (The Undefeated has now been repackaged as Andscape.) He quoted Howard recalling the list of individuals refusing to work with Whitlock that included Smith’s name and other big names at ESPN and elsewhere at the time. Smith then recounted Whitlock begging his forgiveness after Smith felt betrayed by Whitlock.
Stephen A. didn’t specifically mention what happened between the pair that led to this feeling beyond Whitlock criticizing him publicly and trying to befriend him privately, but later on said that both Dan Le Batard and Isiah Thomas (!!!) reached out to him to try to mend fences. However, Smith made it clear that he was not interested because of what he thinks of Whitlock as a person. (Spoiler: it’s not very positive.)
3) “Jason Whitlock pounced on it because that’s what he does. You see what he does is, he’s the one that puts himself in front of white folks. The white folks, not all white folks, not most white folks, but the white folks that dare we say may have a problem with black folks. He says ‘I’m your man.’ That’s what he does. You think I’m lying? Ask ESPN. Ask Fox. Ask the Kansas City Star. Ask them all.”
“I could not imagine, as a black man, knowing our history, anything worse than a white supremacist. That is until Jason Whitlock came along. He’s worse than them. He is the worst, most despicable, lying, no-good, fat-ass human being I have ever known in my life.”
— sportsvids99 (@sportsvids991) January 11, 2024
Arguably the most explosive part of the rant, and one that’ll likely be replayed countless times on social media, is Smith calling Whitlock “worse” than a white supremacist. Smith referenced the Deadspin article once again and Whitlock’s hiring of Mike Wise, who is white, at The Undefeated, which was a site centered on Black sports and culture. While Smith was complimentary of Wise as a person, he questioned Whitlock’s decision-making and leadership while at The Undefeated and pretty much everywhere else he’s ever been.
4) “I have a contract that I negotiated with ESPN that I signed in 2015. I don’t know of anyone who has this in their contracts. I had it in my contract, and I have a copy of it, where it specifically stipulates that I never work with Jason Whitlock. It’s in writing. No wonder you didn’t see him on First Take.”
Smith revealed that he actually has it in his contract, and who wouldn’t believe him at this point, that he is to never work with Whitlock. The two haven’t been colleagues for years, but they were at ESPN together from 2013-2015. Whitlock was hired by then ESPN President John Skipper to run The Undefeated as a counterpunch to Fox Sports’ launch of FS1. Whitlock was even working on material for FS1 at the time he was hired by ESPN. Smith also called it the biggest mistake of Skipper’s tenure as ESPN President. He also mentioned several others in sports media – Skip Bayless, Jemele Hill, Michael Smith, Chris Broussard, and more – who would also never allow Whitlock on their shows.
5) “I know Mark Levin well, we have one another on speed dial. We talk all the time. The same applies to Sean Hannity.”
Ok, so this isn’t about Whitlock directly but can you just imagine a phone conversation between Mark Levin and Stephen A. Smith? The decibels on that call might be louder than Arrowhead Stadium during the NFL Playoffs.
6) “The real reason he’s there is he can’t get a job anywhere else. He hasn’t burnt bridges he’s napalmed them. Call Eric Shanks and Charlie Dixon at Fox. Call Jimmy Pitaro, Burke Magnus, Dave Roberts, Norby Williamson at ESPN. Call them, call them. Call John Skipper and Meadowlark Media. I’m giving you names!”
Shoutout to the original bridge napalmer himself, Keith Olbermann. The quote came from longtime ESPN PR executive Mike Soltys about Olbermann’s original unceremonious exit from the network. Ironically, Olbermann actually did return to ESPN after napalming those bridges years later. Whitlock’s return is a little less likely.
7) “My name for Jason Whitlock is, religiously, Cain. C-A-I-N. You see, a lot of black folks, we talk about how we’re the original man on the face of this earth. That means Cain was the original murderer. Because he’s the one according to the Bible who killed Abel. That’s Jason Whitlock. There is nothing good about him. Absolutely nothing.”
Hopefully, Smith went over the Biblical rhetoric with his pastor in the pregame coach’s meeting to make sure everything here was theologically accurate.
8) “You were a great writer. Your mistake was you started talking. And worse, wanting to be seen while you were talking. Which is why your quality and your value plummeted. Cause when we see you, and we listen to you, we know how worthless you are.”
This was the one compliment that Smith paid Whitlock in the 40 minutes of ranting, calling him a great writer. It’s like the sandwich approach to giving feedback. Except usually most people try to sneak in some constructive feedback between bits of praise. Here it’s just one tiny compliment sandwiched between two big steaming toxic waste dumps of uncensored hatred.
9) “My apologies to everybody that you had to see me out of character to address this dude. But I ask for everybody’s indulgence for one show and one show only. And please do not allow this to be a reflection on my character because this is not how I act every day. But I mean it from my soul when I say this is the worst human being I’ve ever known. I don’t know of another human being worse than Jason Whitlock. He is a piece of shit. He’s the dude that’s going to have a funeral and ain’t going to be no pallbearers.”
Smith’s final burial of Whitlock, appropriately enough, ended with his own vision of what his rival’s funeral might look like. Clearly, this won’t be over until one man posts on his social media that he went to his biggest hater’s funeral today. Hopefully Awful Announcing will still be around to chronicle it when that happens years from now.
One thing is for sure, Jimmy Kimmel and Aaron Rodgers got nothing on this feud.
