ESPN anchor Stephen A. Smith had some deep thoughts to share about Ayesha Curry’s now-deleted tweets about the NBA Finals, and just in general how NBA wives should be seen and not heard. They’re quite insightful! Just kidding; the ESPN commentator was full of hot garbage as per usual.
On Friday’s episode of ESPN’s First Take, which should be renamed Hot Take, Smith said,
If that was Savannah, LeBron’s wife. If that were Gloria, LeBron’s mother. What would we be saying? LeBron James has a mom and has a wife, has kids, great guy, an even greater ambassador of the game of basketball than Steph Curry because he’s done it over the test of time. Wonderful, beautiful father. And I’ve got news for you: As beautiful as everyone wants to say Ayesha Curry is, and she is, Savannah is something special. I’m here to tell you something right now. Ain’t a man alive, particularly a black man, that’s going to look at LeBron James’s wife and not say that that woman ain’t gorgeous. She’s wonderful inside and out. She sits there, she doesn’t bring any attention to herself. She never tweets and goes out there and calls out the league and stuff like that. And nobody — nobody — is more scrutinized than her husband. But yet, she thinks about how she represents him, and as a result, she doesn’t do that.
In response, Ayesha Curry tweeted at him, “Why are you putting two women against each other like that? You’re the one that’s out of pocket.”
Naturally, Smith put on his favorite fedora and “Well, actually“-ed Curry, with garbage like, “What I am trying to explain to you, Mrs. Ayesha Curry, is that it’s not me, it’s you. Because what happens is that when you’re out there tweeting and saying the things that you’re saying, you are putting your husband in a precarious position.”
Smith isn’t exactly known for his enlightened views on women. In addition to garden-variety sexist crap like suggesting a German soccer team missed blocking a goal by Norway because they were concerned about “mess[ing] their hair,” Smith has also been quick to dismiss criticism of boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr., who has a history of gruesome domestic violence, and suggested that in the case of Ray Rice’s abuse of his wife, we really need to examine “elements of provocation.”
Ayesha Curry, on the other hand, continues not to give a flying you-know-what about Smith’s opinion, which is a position we can all get behind.
