Gene Demby
Appearances
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Oh, always, always a pleasure. Anytime. Be safe out.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Well, I mean, Stephen A. Smith was a Daily Beat reporter in Philadelphia covering basketball, and he became a basketball insider. And then he got invited into the world of cable news, and so he worked at CNN. Then he was at ESPN, and he became a star, right?
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I mean, anybody that sees Stephen A. Smith talk, like, he's the sort of person that if you're walking through an airport and you see ESPN on TV, like, your eyes are drawn to Stephen A. Smith. So he's got that sort of magnetic personality.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
He's captivating when he gets rolling, right? And so he's, you know, been on sort of this trajectory for the last few years. He's accrued a lot more power and a lot more prominence over like the last five, 10 years. ESPN has shared a lot of their more prominent personalities, people like Bomani Jones, Dan Lebitard, folks like that who've moved on.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
And so this created more of a room for him to kind of stretch out and be like, this is my network. I mean, the biggest way you see that represented is his $20 million a year salary, right? And why would he want to run for president? I mean, this is a guy who has done some acting on General Hospital. He's made all the rounds on all these cable news shows. He was just on Sean Hannity, right?
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Talking about this very topic. And so it kind of gets to why would he want to do this? Well, it increases your public profile. Stephen A. Smith is already very popular, but it only can help.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Well, he calls himself an independent. I mean, he's been pretty adamant about the fact that I'm not a Democrat, nor am I a Republican. And it's sort of the cliche, I'm a staunch conservative when it comes to my money. So he doesn't want to pay taxes, right? He's a rich guy that doesn't want to pay taxes.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
But he says, I believe in live and let live, whatever that means, because it's not like he supports trans inclusion in sports, right? We have to sort of take his word that he believes in, you know, sort of like a cultural progressiveness. Maybe he has that. That's what he says he has. But, you know, it remains to be seen.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Yeah, so I just started working at ESPN right around that time.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
So after Jamel does this, there's this big meeting in Bristol, Connecticut, which is the ESPN headquarters, right? And they fly everybody in. So just imagine everybody famous you've seen on ESPN is there in this room. I'm there with them. And I actually sat next to Jamel Hill during this presentation. Part of it was about...
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Extensively, it was about the direction of the company and assuring people about, you know, this is a bad time for a cable news channel. We're hemorrhaging viewers. Everybody's saying ESPN is hyperpolitical. But it was also just an occasion to roll out our social media policy.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
And that is when you started seeing a lot more emphasis on like, hey, I don't want you saying nothing about politics or mentioning Donald Trump or anything like that on air or on social media. Once I went on vacation to Cancun, I'm down there with my wife having a good time. You know, I'm about to get in a pool and I get a call from my editor to tell me, hey, man, the Roseanne show got canceled.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Make sure you don't tweet about that.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I mean, I think people remember why Roseanne got her show canceled. She had said some pretty regrettable things. And people probably could imagine where I might have fallen on that. But because ESPN did not want us talking about that stuff, I was unable to and I did not. But anyway, that's just sort of the climate we had found ourselves in at ESPN during those years.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
It's good with you, Brittany. Yeah, appreciate us having you back. Yeah.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
So I've seen Stephen A. Smith basically say, well, I just think everybody's crazy and we need to move to the center, right? That is basically his biggest political talking point. And he'll go on any outlet to talk about this. And so the way he's leveraging it is by just drawing more attention to himself and his brand. And so it gives him some sort of influence, whether or not he chooses...
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
to use it for political means but it means that like whether we believe he should be a political figure or not or whether he believes he is or not he is one when you go into Sean Hannity multiple times I mean it's also just kind of disingenuous to say you're not a political figure I mean you are bro sorry for sure
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Oh, let's go. Okay, yeah, come on. Let's do it.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I'm going to say 26.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I say the Celtics, but I'm open to the idea of the OKC Thunder. OKC Thunder.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
It was C. I'm going to go B. Rocket Man seems like the more appropriate song.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Come on, man. I'm just here. Well, we see how washed I am. I have two kids. Gene has one.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Yeah. I'm even more washed. Yeah.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
Oh, that's pity. That's pity, by the way. I recognize what it is. It's not pity.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I'm thinking, it seems like you got to have your money.
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I mean, $150,000, you know. $150,000, yeah, I could see some like. Get somebody that I don't want. You think Master P? You went if Master P was like, well, I got $150,000, I can do that. They don't want to open it up like that. Yeah, like, Memphis Bleak, can you go this way?
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I was like, I want to be up there, too, you know?
It's Been a Minute
Are men in your life getting more political? This guy may be why.
I'm not seeing the appeal. And I'm glad you said Cheesecake Factory. That's a real salt of the earth type of restaurant.