SO, AMERICA! AS EVIDENCED BY THE NABJ GIVING STEPHEN A. SMITH ITS “THUMB’S DOWN AWARD,” I GET THE SENSE THAT SOME PEOPLE ARE WAKING UP IN THIS COUNTRY AND - FINALLY - DEMANDING SOME ACCOUNTABILITY. AS USUAL, THOUGH, IT ALWAYS SEEMS TO BEGIN WITH BLACK PEOPLE...
And not the rich white influential people who have run The United States as long as you have been alive.
And your parents...
And their parents...
And... well, you get the picture.
Now, the sole reason I don’t take issue with The National Association of Black Journalists going after Stephen A. Smith - Disney / ESPN’s $100 million dollar man - is because Smith has allowed himself to be used by rich white influential men to never speak so harshly of them as he routinely does Black people.
And as he almost never does when it comes to Donald Trump.
Who has attacked Black people in 2025-’26 more than olden day US presidents who actually owned slaves.
No, I don’t mind people going after Smith - finally - because I know him better than most all of you.
Because I was for nearly two decades one of his closest friends.
And I saw how money, fame and power transformed him.
And for the last year or so, I was begging you all to help ME go after him.
And I felt I was going it alone.
But the shot the NABJ publicly took at SAS shows me I am not alone at all.
They see what I see.
They see what I saw back in 2009 when our friendship ended because I had the audacity to warn him about himself.
In fact, EVERYONE close enough to challenge Steve and his ever-lofty, right-wing, know it all opinion of himself, got the boot.
Max Kellerman.
First Take co-host Molly Qerim.
And ME.
And not one of us - who cared deeply about this man - could stop the crash of his train.
But that is what is happening now.
Because his voice has grown too powerful.
And too toxic.
And he wants to be the US president.
And that cannot happen.
Because we have seen what ego-driven, money-hungry, power-craving TV personalities can do when they are given this nation’s steering wheel.
We get driven off a cliff.
Speaking of driving, I am reminded of many nights and early mornings when Steve would call my apartment and we’d drive the New York City streets to White Castle in Queens (which recently closed
, btw!)vand he would tell me his hopes and dreams.
What he was happy with and what he wasn’t.
It was ALWAYS about him and what HE wanted and what HE thought was important.
And I did not mind because he was my friend and I wanted him to shine.
And every day I awoke thinking of him as head writer of his ESPN TV show, Quite Frankly With Stephen A. Smith, always trying to paint him in the best possible light.
And every day he would say a little something that I could not abide - until I finally said something to him.
Which HE could not abide.
And then, Training Day was over.
I was out.
And in all these years since, I have watched from afar as he walked towards a seemingly inevitable abyss.
And now he is there.
Having reached the limits of power.
Of money.
Of fame.
And, today, quite possibly the start of the end of it all.
Because he can’t stop talking.
Can’t stop raging.
Can’t stop defending.
Against what everyone but him can clearly see.
Which reminds me of the final scene in that Denzel Washington / Ethan Hawke movie, where Denzel’s rogue detective is flailing, lost, cursing and threatening the community that once celebrated him.
The community that MADE him.
And he, of course, will rage against The NABJ as he never did when Donald Trump called him “Low IQ.”
And nobody will care.
Because they have seen this movie before.
In fact, we have seen ALL of Stephen A. Smith’s movies.
And his moves.
Training Day, it seems, is over.
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