Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless might not agree on a lot, but they do agree on who deserves credit for building First Take.
As Smith publicly battles Michelle Beadle, Cari Champion, and Jemele Hill, he put the feud on pause to defend and credit Bayless. Because while Smith brought First Take to new heights in the last decade, the show was already successful with Bayless at the helm.
“When it comes to Skip Bayless, something that never gets said to him or about him is about to be said now,” Smith began on a recent episode of his SiriusXM show Straight Shooter. “That man is owed an apology. From me. That’s my guy. And in the midst of talking about Cari Champion, and in the midst of talking about Jemele Hill and some of the things Jemele Hill alluded to, I was so busy clapping back for a damn change and defending myself that I dropped the ball. I neglected to do what I always do, which was give the true credit where it’s due. And that’s to that man, Skip Bayless.”
The shortened version of a rather long backstory to this is Champion recently urged Smith to respond to a criticism from Beadle about his controversial Solitaire Cash app ads with the same vitriol he has when feuding with Black women. While responding to Champion, Smith essentially claimed he brought her to ESPN, a claim that was later refuted by Hill.
During her response, Hill recalled feeling Champion was often disrespected by Smith and Bayless on First Take, and when she expressed that belief more than a decade ago, it led to a falling out with Bayless. According to Hill, she received an email from Bayless saying he felt betrayed and taking credit for giving her a platform on First Take. And more than 10 years later, they haven’t spoken since.
Days after he defended himself in response to Champion and Hill, Smith came to the realization that he also should have defended Bayless, which is what led to this lengthy apology.
“When Cold Pizza was rebranded as First Take in 2007 and Skip was sitting across from people debating,” Smith continued. “Jemele Hill was one of those people. Michael Smith was one of those people, the 2 Live Stews, Chris Broussard was one of those people. Rob Parker was one of those people…let’s be very, very clear, diversity was always important to Skip.”
According to Smith, Bayless is one that if you have an issue with something he said or did, he expects you to approach him about it personally. And Smith doesn’t feel like Hill did that with Bayless more than 10 years ago, just as Champion didn’t do it with him last week.
“That’s why I could sit up here and apologize for my negligence in not emphasizing during that diatribe the things that needed to be emphasized because it was exactly my issue with Cari Champion. If we indeed have an issue, how come I didn’t know about it? How come the first time I’m hearing about it is when you’re posting something on social media?” Smith asked. “That is a turnoff. That is insulting for somebody that was mindful enough to sit up there and say, ‘Yo, you’re a talent, this is what you bring to the table, I like you, I want you as part of the team.’ Which Skip did for an abundance of us, including those two ladies.”
Bayless helped build First Take, that’s undebatable. Whether that was ultimately a good thing for sports media, however, is debatable. But Hill didn’t really say anything bad about Bayless, so it’s somewhat bizarre that Smith felt compelled to apologize for not addressing this sooner. Because much like most of this continuous exchange of accounts from things that happened at First Take more than 10 years ago, this feud between Smith, Champion, Hill, and now Bayless seems like much ado about nothing.
