Before Stephen A Smith would tell a handful of players, mostly in the NFL to Stay Off
The Weed
Before Stephen A Smith would be known for constantly debating his former co host Skip
Bayless on pretty much everything
Before Stephen A Smith would become one of the most popular figures in the sports world,
known for his on personality on both First Take and his own radio show, The Stephen A
Smith show
Love him or hate him, Stephen A Smith has become a polarizing figure in the sports world.
From growing up in Queens, New York, to getting a college basketball scholarship, and eventually
becoming one of the most talked about sports analysts out there, Stephen A has made quite
a name for himself.
Starting off writing for his college paper calling for his coach to retire, before eventually
working for the Philadelphia Inquirer and becoming the most well known host of ESPN’s
First Take, Smith is quite often talked about for using the phrase Blasphemous to describe
plays that, to Smith seem completely out of whack, calling Aaron Rodgers a baaaaaad man
and of course his hated for the Dallas Cowboys, which I can easily get behind.
They suck, go Eagles.
In fact, someone even made a song about Smith’s hatred for the cowboys.
What's going on guys?
My name is Jarred Bronstein and welcome back to Before They Were Famous.
In our last few videos we covered the 2k Goat Chris Smoove as per your requests, so we figured
you guys would want more coverage on the basketball world.
Keep sending in your requests in the comments down below as always, and today’s trivia
question is what soap opera did Smith make his acting debut on?
Let me know in the comments below, I’ll answer the question at the end of the video,
now let's got on with this show.
Stephen Anthony Smith was born on October 14th, 1967 in The Bronx, New York.
He is the youngest of 6 children, with four older sisters and a younger brother, Basil,
who passed away in a car accident in 1992.
Smith also has a half brother from his father’s side.
Smith’s parents are from the St. Thomas Virgin Islands, with his mother, Janet Smith,
working 16 hour days, 7 days a week to provide for the family.
Smith’s dad, who’s name was unobtainable, was believed to manage a hardware store, but
was also known to be an outstanding baseball and basketball star, who was drafted by the
Giants back in the 1950’s according to Stephen himself.
Although Smith was born in the Bronx, he grew up in Queens, more specifically, Hollis.
Smith would attend Thomas Edison High School in Queens, where he would graduate before
going to the Fashion Institute of Technology for a year.
Growing up Smith would be an avid sports junkie, watching football and baseball religiously,
while playing basketball in the New York Streets.
His childhood hobby of playing ball would eventually lead to a scholarship at Winston
Salem State University, which would be the reason for his transfer after just 1 year
at the Fashion Institute.
Apparently Smith was actually a pretty good basketball player.
I meant if he got a scholarship he couldn’t of been all that bad.
I tried to find the man’s college stats and couldn’t find anything.
Granted, he played back in the 80’s but still, his stats shouldn’t be that hard
to find.
Thankfully Skip Bayless, his former co-host was able to find some stats on Stephen and
apparently he actually wasn’t all that great of a player.
More specifically, at least according to Skip, he shot to many 3’s, and missed a lot of
them.
However his college basketball career would help be the birth of his journalism and sports
broadcasting career.
While playing for the team, Smith wrote one article about his coach at the time, Clarance
Big House Gaines, who Smith explains was not only a coach, but a father figure and a huge
inspiration to him.
While still playing under coach Gaines, Smith wrote an article calling for his coach to
retire in the school’s newspaper.
This would lead to a huge backlash for a young Smith, who’s known for his controversial
remarks.
Smith however, didn’t care that the chancellor of the school wanted him expelled and that
a bunch of people we’re asking how he could do that to his own coach.
In an interview Smith explained how he told the Coach he needed to retire and if he didn’t,
he’d be writing an article about it.
Coach told him to go right ahead.
Speaking on the backlash of the situation, Smith told The Oklahoman in a phone interview
“Coach Gaines was the one that stepped up and said, “Leave that boy alone.
I told him it was OK for him to write.”
And I didn’t get to tell them, because my attitude was if you don’t know how close
he and I were and how much I love that man, then you don’t know me at all and it’s
not even worth the time of day and I’m not even going to try to explain it.”
In a tribute to the late coach, Stephen A only had kind things
to say.
Smith’s big break came from his professor at Winston Salem State, who also worked as
an editorial page editor for the Winston Salem Journal.
John Gates approached Smith one day after class, claiming after reading his essay he
thinks Smith was born a sports writer.
This would lead to Gates setting up an appointment with Terry Oberle, who at the time was the
sports editor of the newspaper.
After a brief 5 minute meeting, Smith was hired as a clerk in the sports department.
About 3 weeks into his gig with the Winston Salem Journal, Smith was given the assignment
to do a story on the Wake Forrest soccer team, who at the time were the third ranked team
in the country.
Without any knowledge on soccer, Smith went to the team’s coach, Walt Chyzowych, and
told him honestly, he didnt know much about soccer but he’s trying to be a sportswriter
and this is incredibly important to him.
The coach invited him back the next day, giving him access to him and his team, to ask whatever
questions he wanted to needed over the span of the next three days.
With all of this information, the paper was able to write a two page story on the school’s
soccer program.
According to Smith, “After I wrote the piece, Terry Oberle called me into his office the
next day and said, “Congratulations, you are now the beat writer for Wake Forest soccer.”
From there, my career took off.”
Smith would also write for the New York Daily News, covering high school sports before he
would eventually be hired by the Philadelphia Inquirer in 1994 as a writer.
He claims in his first 13 years there, he would be promoted a total of nine times.
He told The Oklahoman “ I ultimately went from general assignment, to beats on St. Joe’s
and Temple, to backup writer, to NBA writer to NBA columnist to ultimately, in 2003, to
general sports columns.
That was my ultimate dream, to be a columnist, because I always knew that I wanted to have
the license to express myself, my opinion as opposed to be restricted to just reporting.
I wanted to express my thoughts, my feelings, my opinions.
At the time, that was my greatest achievement, becoming a columnist.”
In that same year Smith would join ESPN as an analyst for the network’s pre game show
to featured NBA Games.
In 2005, Smith would get his big break with the sports channel, getting both his own radio
show, The Stephen A Smith show, from 2005-2008 and hosting the Quite Frankly with Stephen
A Smith show, from 05-07.
In 2007, Smith would be demoted from his position at the Philadelphia Inquirer, going back to
the position of General Sports Columnist.
Less than a year later, Smith would be fired from his job, but rehired in 2010 after winning
an arbitrators ruling that he should be reinstated, so long as he removed his political views
from his cable shows.
While all this was going down, he would also announce he’d be leaving ESPN in May of
2009, just a few years after his show Quite Frankly would be cancelled.
But it wouldn’t be long before Smith would join Fox Sports Radio in November of 2009,
as an on air contributor.
On January 4th, 2010 Smith would become a Fox Sports morning show host, replacing Steve
Czaban.
To his credit, Smith predicted the big 3, Lebron, Dwayne Wade and Bosh would link up
in Miami during the 2010 free agency.
But just over a year later, on February 1st, 2011, it was announced Smith would be retting
to ESPN as a columnist for their website and host for one of their local New York radio
shows.
On April 30th, 2012 Smith would join First Take commentator Skip Bayless for a daily
segment called Embrace Debate.
This is what would really put Smith on the map, for his argumentative and hilarious ways,
when debating Bayless.
Following his return ESPN, he would once again leave their radio programming while still
appearing on First Takes.
He’d join the Mad Dog Sports Channel on serious Radio in September 2014, just a few
months after he made controversial comments about the Ray Rice situation on First Takes,
which would lead to a 1 week suspension for the outspoken host.
But Smith would once again return to ESPN’s on air show after leaving Mad Dog back in
January of 2017.
As many of you know, Smith is still a host on the popular EPSN show, First Takes, who
he hosts with Max Kellerman and Molly Qerim, since Skip Bayless left the show
in 2016.
Although it seems Smith and Bayless had their fair share of bad blood, the two loved working
together and although they might not always see eye to eye, it seems they would always
have each others back.
As for the rest of the story, well we’re gonna have to wait to find out because this
is before they were famous.
I’m sure there will be plenty more headlines throughout Stephen’s career, because he
says what he wants, when he wants, and will always stand by it.
Now to answer our trivia question, Smith guest stared on the popular soap opera, General
Hospital, with his debut back on February 2 of 2007.
It’s believed his character, Brick, might even be making a comeback sometime soon, but
until that happens we just have to enjoy
this clip.
I'm wrapping up this video here, My name is Jarred Bronstein.
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