Stephen A. Smith Says ESPN NBA List Hurts ESPN’s ‘Credibility’: TRAINA THOUGHTS
JIMMY TRAINA1 HOUR AGO
1. Thank you, Stephen A. Smith.
The ESPN talking head helped prove the point I was trying to make in
Tuesday’s Traina Thoughts when I wrote the following about the network
firing Paul Pierce:
There’s also a little bit of "Jordan Rules" going on here. If Pierce were a top ESPN talent, he would’ve been suspended. Remember when Tony Kornheiser criticized Hannah Storm’s wardrobe choices?
That got Tony a suspension. One ESPN personality personally attacking another ESPN personality seems much worse than a guy doing an R-rated Instagram Live.
Right on cue, Stephen A. blasted ESPN on Tuesday’s
First Take over
some meaningless ranking of NBA players.
“This is the stuff that diminishes the credibility of ESPN,” Smith ranted. “This is our list, right? Am I correct about this? I believe it’s our list. Yes, it is. What the hell? ESPN needs to drug test anybody that had something to do with this list. It made no sense.”
Smith then went on to scream some stuff about
LaMelo Ball,
Devin Booker,
Jayson Tatum and
Donovan Mitchell before going into full performance artist mode to bash ESPN again.
“What the hell is going on?” he asked. “I believe that ESPN should call security right now and go to whoever put this list together on ESPN.com. Line ‘em up and test every one of them. Every one of them! Somebody’s out of it. You gotta be kidding me. This don’t make any sense right here.”
Since
Smith is a pro at this schtick, he was smart enough to turn to humor by using the drug testing line, but if you think that
any ESPN personality can get away with calling the network’s credibility into question, think again.
Even with tongue in cheek, ESPN does not want anyone at the network, including its top performance artist to joke about “credibility.” It’s a powerful word. Plus, I’m sure the writers of the list were
thrilled to hear they are responsible for hurting the credibility of the most powerful sports media company in the world.
Today, ESPN posted a big feature article by Bobby Marks, Mike Schmitz, and Kevin Pelton ranking the top-25 players in the NBA under the age of 25 based on their
www.thebiglead.com
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