The Dallas Cowboys’ loss to the Houston Texans on Monday Night Football put America’s Team back in the spotlight on Tuesday morning — as if they wouldn’t have been there anyways. And it also prompted Stephen A. Smith to compare Jerry Jones to Joe Biden, and not in a flattering way.
“I’m not joking when I say this: I’m getting very, very worried about Jerry Jones,” Smith said on Tuesday’s episode of ESPN’s First Take. “Because the only thing that’s worse than the team’s play is his press conferences… where he says one thing after another, after another. I find myself thinking about Joe Biden before he backed out of running for reelection. I think Jerry’s one month older than President Joe Biden for crying out loud.
“I remember when I was on the airwaves, literally guys, nine, 10 months ago, and I was like, ‘He can’t be the nominee. He ain’t gonna make it to the Democratic National Convention. Y’all got to change. Y’all got to do something to change.’ And I’m looking at Jerry, and I find myself asking where the hell is Stephen Jones? Where the hell are his family members? I know he’s the owner and the president and the GM and I get all that. But somebody in your inner circle has to be able to stop you from just adding fuel to the fire. Because it is so bad right now, they’ve literally taken the fun out of it.”
Stephen A. Smith “I’m getting very very worried about Jerry Jones… I find myself thinking about Joe Biden before he backed out of running for reelection. I think Jerry’s one month older than President Joe Biden for crying out loud… where the hell are his family members?” pic.twitter.com/8YMpffSMX8
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 19, 2024
In a surprising twist, Smith didn’t give himself enough credit here; he had actually been sounding the alarm on the 81-year-old Biden’s candidacy nearly a year before the disastrous debate performance that precipitated him dropping out of the 2024 race. And while running the United States obviously isn’t the same as running an NFL team, the ESPN star raises a valid point in noting the bizarre nature of some of Jones’ recent interactions with the media and questioning how they might be connected to the 82-year-old’s age.
Later in the segment, Shannon Sharpe brought Smith’s comparison back up, noting that while the Jones-Biden comparison might be an apt one, there’s at least one major difference in their respective situations.
Shannon Sharpe: “The difference between what you said about President Biden and Jerry is that that big donors came in and said, ‘President Biden, we’re not going to donate unless you drop out.’ What do they say to Jerry?”
Molly Qerim: “Since we keep referencing politics, I also… pic.twitter.com/gMk4ZsFMjv
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 19, 2024
“Big donors came in and said, ‘President Biden, we’re not going to donate unless you drop out,'” the Hall of Fame tight end said. “What do they say to Jerry to get Jerry to stop talking?”
That prompted host Molly Qerim to try her own hand at not sticking to sports.
“Since we keep referencing politics, I also have a fake statistic. [Jones] said since those Super Bowls in the 90s, they have the sixth-best winning percentage. They actually have the 11th,” Qerim said. “That’s fake news right there.”
[First Take]
