Something especially awful is happening when you find that Stephen A. Smith is the least insufferable person in a conversation.
That nightmare became real last Thursday when Smith’s co-host, resident ESPN troll Skip Bayless, dueled with Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman on the network’s mockery of a morning show, “First Take.”
The whole scenario was one that “First Take” thrives on – bring together the curmudgeonly 61-year-old white dude from Oklahoma and a younger, wealthier, black counterpart and “embrace the debate,” as the show’s slogan goes, that arises from the culture clash.
Sherman, the notoriously confident and opinionated All-Pro, certainly fit the bill. But he didn’t come merely to “embrace debate.” Sherman’s sole mission was to destroy Bayless, announced clearly when he stated “I’m gonna crush you on here, in front of everybody,” after referring to Bayless as “ignorant, pompous (and) egotistical.”
Bayless tried to shift Sherman’s rage in a different direction, asking some producer-manufactured question about his rivalry with Darrelle Revis, but Sherman didn’t bite, instead responding with a succinct summation of his entire anti-Bayless argument.
“I’m better at life than you,” Sherman said.
Sherman’s smackdown, delivered on Bayless’ home turf, was glorious, entertaining and long overdue. It’s also a bit depressing, because you know that Sherman gave Bayless and “First Take” producers exactly what they wanted. The show lives for that kind of unproductive confrontation – argument for argument’s sake – and the attention it provides. For “First Take,” any publicity is good publicity, and an obvious verbal brawl with a prominent athlete is sure to provide just that.
These criticisms of “First Take” from media critics, bloggers or college newspaper columnists are nothing new. But when they’re voiced by Bill Simmons, one of ESPN’s most prominent personalities, the situation changes.
Simmons, named the most powerful person in sports media by Sports Illustrated last week, started off lightly, tweeting “It’s amazing to me that people get so worked up about ‘First Take.’ Who cares? Just don’t watch it. There are like 800 TV channels.”
After a few minutes, though, Simmons went farther.
“I am not defending this segment – I thought it was embarrassing to everyone involved. Seriously,” Simmons said.
He ended by indirectly answering the question posed in the first tweet.
“But what bothers me about the reaction to that segment is people saying Richard Sherman ‘won,’” Simmons said. “Nobody won. Everyone lost. Including ESPN.”
It’s clear that plenty of people, even within ESPN itself, care a lot about “First Take.” They’ve been fed up for awhile; it just took something particularly pointless and unpleasant, such as Sherman versus Bayless, for those views to come out.
Simmons’ criticism isn’t important because of his popularity alone. He’s also been the driving force behind the “30 for 30” film series and Grantland.com, two of ESPN’s highest quality ventures.
That means Simmons knows that a network that has the resources and creativity to create “30 for 30” has no excuse for airing four hours of phony, self-serving “debate” that adds nothing relevant to the public discussion. He knows plenty of ESPN employees more worthy of that airtime than the “First Take” panelists, instigators whose acts range from unfunny (Bayless repeatedly refers to Chris Bosh as “Bosh Spice”) to disgraceful (since-fired panelist Rob Parker called Robert Griffin III a “cornball brother”).
ESPN has gone all-in on its embrace of debate, inserting more polls and manufactured arguments throughout its programming. It’s always been the premise for shows like “First Take” and “Around the Horn,” but now even “SportsCenter” spends time debating questions like “Bigger blowout: Blackhawks over Heat in hockey or Heat over Blackhawks in basketball?” (Next they can ask which team would benefit more from trading for Tim Tebow.)
As this trend continues, ESPN’s greatest worry shouldn’t be Simmons’ criticism itself; it should be that his millions of loyal online followers, which ostensibly make up a large chunk of the network’s TV viewership, feel cheated in the same way and refuse to tune in to anything but live sporting events.
That’s the only wake-up call that will force ESPN to dump people like Bayless and programs like “First Take,” to provide real journalism rather than performance art. And if Simmons has the power ascribed to him, that wake-up call is coming soon.