Stephen A. Smith would like even more of your attention

JERSEY CITY — One recent afternoon, Stephen A. Smith was standing center stage on a set that only recently sprang from his imagination but now had all the bells and whistles: lights above, four cameras, video screens, a long, late-night-TV-style couch, a wall of photos of Smith with his famous acquaintances — Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, Taylor Swift.

He was contemplating a question: Which SpongeBob character would make the best NFL quarterback? On the screen was a lineup of deep-sea creatures from the Nickelodeon cartoon: A crab, a plankton, the famous sponge.

“Ladies and gentleman, I haven’t seen much of SpongeBob,” Smith said. “Damn it! But I’m going to entertain y’all by guessing. … Let me just look at it and gauge who looks the most athletic.”

He stepped toward the camera. Jiggled his eyebrows, pursed his lips. Then he launched into the take.

“I’m not interested in Plankton. I don’t like the way he looks.”

“Patrick … you look like a pink skinhead.”

Finally, the verdict: “I’m going to go with Mr. Krabs. That’s what I’m going to do. SpongeBob’s legs are too skinny, the head looks like it weighs too much and the arms are too short.”

Smith, 56, is the long-running host of ESPN’s debate show, “First Take,” where his longevity, ubiquity and uncanny ability to deliver opinions have made him the most famous talking head in sports. This studio, though, belongs not to ESPN but to Smith, and it’s home to his namesake podcast and YouTube show.

Smith has spent more than $1.5 million of his own money here, renting the space and buying equipment, he said. He launched the show last year through his production company, Mr. SAS Productions. Between the control room and the studio, a staff of 15 — including graphics editors, a social media manager, a writer, producers and a director — gathers here and in Los Angeles three times a week to produce each episode.

The objective, Smith said, is simple: growth in every way. More audience, more clout, more money. It’s why, on top of this and his ESPN duties, he regularly appears on CNN and Fox News with his friend Sean Hannity to talk politics, why he guest-hosted Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night talk show a few years ago. With his ESPN contract expiring next year, the exposure will, in theory, make him the highest-paid talent at the network — somewhere north of around $20 million a year.

Asked about his aspirations to be the highest-paid talker at ESPN, Smith bristled — not at the substance of the question but that anyone is still asking.

“You look at my contemporaries and their ratings compared to my ratings,” he said. “Why ask me when everything — metrically, analytically — says that I should be?”

But cable-TV stardom is no longer enough to satisfy him. In an era when the influence of the cable bundle is shrinking; when everyone from Reese Witherspoon to the Manning brothers have their own production houses; and when the culture’s biggest shapers, including fellow ESPN star Pat McAfee, are on YouTube and Spotify, Smith wants to be a franchise with relevance that spans sports, politics, internet and pop culture.

The SpongeBob question was submitted from a viewer on X, and it capped an episode in which Smith hosted Roland Martin for a segment on affirmative action (“The black eagle Joe Madison said it best when he talked about cultural conditioning”); weighed in on a simmering beef between Megan Thee Stallion and Nicki Minaj (“Can we all just get along?”); and defended Snoop Dogg’s defense of Donald Trump (“I’m not going to condemn my boy.”).

Smith used to be routinely lampooned — “the final triumph of bluster and confidence over content,” a Sports Illustrated writer once said — but today, his naked-as-ever ambition is more often viewed as less an affront to the industry than a fact of life. “America has a Strange New Respect for Stephen A.,” the Ringer’s Bryan Curtis wrote in 2019. Now Smith is testing just how much Stephen A. America wants, or can take.

Before shooting, Smith bounced between the set and the control room. He wanted a graphic ready to promote Martin’s book, and to move a boxing segment to the C block. “Follow me,” Smith instructed the jib camera operator, as he choreographed how he would move across the set. “Stay close.”

After the episode wrapped, Smith sat at the desk, a panoramic of the New York City skyline, the backdrop of his set, behind him. “If you want to be viewed a certain way,” he said, “you have to show them you can do it.”

Stephen A. Smith would like even more of your attention

IT’S A HALF-HOUR DRIVE to here from ESPN’s Manhattan studios, where Smith films “First Take” most mornings. He prefers to drive himself, ever since his brother was killed in an accident while riding in a passenger van. In New York, he makes the drive in a Range Rover; in L.A., where he recently bought an apartment, he cruises in a Lamborghini truck.

It’s those two live hours of “First Take” that made Smith famous, dating back to his days of shouting over Skip Bayless. Bayless left for Fox Sports in 2016, but Smith’s star kept rising. Athletes such as Kevin Durant and John Wall publicly feud with him because they watch him, and by now he’s better known than most of the players he covers. He takes a bodyguard to games. (Bayless declined to comment for this story, saying Fox Sports 1 preferred he not participate.)

On YouTube, Smith is trying to take that fame beyond cable and sports. One of his first hires was social media manager Bailey Carlin, who helps to curate fan interaction segments, such as the SpongeBob debate, designed to go viral.

Responding to audience questions, Smith recently declared a Troop song as his favorite sex soundtrack and offered his views on Latina women: “I love me a Spanish-speaking woman.” He has lit social media afire by talking about his sex life.

One of his most-watched segments was a dissection of the top racer from the Pixar franchise “Cars.” During a live call, a producer printed out some quick data on the most Piston Cups (the fictional championship of the film) won by the characters and ran it out to Smith. “Strip Weathers!” Smith said to the caller. “You forgot about him?!?”

One of Smith’s ESPN colleagues, who was not authorized to speak publicly, marveled at the versatility of the Smith take, noting it didn’t matter the subject, from presidential politics to NBA players to cartoons: “The vocabulary is the same,” they said. “The delivery is the same. It’s incredible.”

The point, Smith said, is to resonate.

“I do something about Pokémon the other day, and it’s 14 to 15 million views,” he said. “I had no clue I could do that. But because I said that I would open the floodgates and I would entertain almost anything, all of a sudden you say, ‘Okay, this is what resonates.’ ”

“He’s asking, ‘Why do people care about this? Why did a Pokémon tweet get 100,000 likes?’ ” said Carlin, who founded Bad Brain Digital Consulting. “I’ll say, ‘People love Pokémon, and your pronunciation was funny and genuine, and people appreciate that you don’t blow off any question even if it’s silly.’ ”

Smith’s strategy is classic digital media — part spectacle, part pandering to the algorithm — but ESPN as a network has long leaned heavily on the teams and players with the widest appeal. No one has done it more dramatically than Smith. His approach of poring over minute-by-minute ratings data has served him well. “For me, I know the Dallas Cowboys are going to be very popular,” he said. “That’s a given.”

After Smith’s contract wasn’t renewed by ESPN in 2009, his first stint with the network, Smith did some soul searching and concluded he didn’t understand the business.

“My definition of popularity was people screaming my name in the streets in the arena or seeing an advertisement on the side of a bus stop like it was once in Philadelphia when I was writing for The Philadelphia Inquirer,” he said. “But that’s not popularity. Nothing gives you an idea about that better than ratings and revenue. And once you pay attention to that and you see that for what it is, you understand what your worth is.”

Those in Smith’s orbit today know exactly how well he’s doing because he makes sure they do. When the website Mediaite crowned him the eighth most powerful person in media last year, he sent the link to his boss, among others. (“I thought I should have been higher than eighth,” Smith said.) He sends notes to friends and colleagues about subscriber milestones for his YouTube show.

Recently, Hannity said, Smith texted him after he had gone on CNN one night to tell him a CNN staffer said the ratings spiked 50 percent for his appearance.

“I told him that couldn’t possibly be true,” Hannity said, laughing. “The minute-by-minute data doesn’t come out until the next day.”

SMITH WALKED INTO HIS studio in a slim-fitting blue suit and lugging a makeup kit from “First Take.” He stands 6-foot-1 and is down to 170 pounds from more than 200 last year.

Smith remade his body after he got covid-19 and had surgeries on both rotator cuffs and both knees, which helps him keep up with the grueling new schedule. He’s bounced between a paleo and keto diet. Dana White recommended a trainer, and he’s lifting weights five days a week. (On one afternoon in the studio, he grabbed a slice of pizza and later a handful of Sour Patch Kids. “I ain’t supposed to be eating this stuff, but I’m hungry,” he said.)

Over the course of two days in his studio, Smith’s focus never left the business. He had almost no conversations with anyone, assistants or the crew, that didn’t revolve around scheduling, booking, the show’s lineup or how to shoot it. There was no banter and almost no discernible small talk.

Nothing that Smith is doing with his production company is new, necessarily. What is new is that Smith can plausibly talk about himself in the same company as the Mannings — and just maybe even Reese Witherspoon, who Smith noticed sold her production company for $1 billion. He would like to build his company to include scripted series, and he envisions a studio audience one day watching his show, and potentially licensing his content to networks, whether it’s politics content for CNN, sports for ESPN or someone else. (He said he’s already sold a drama series to a network that will be announced soon.)

“I love Spike Lee,” Smith said. “Tyler Perry is fantastic. Oprah Winfrey speaks for herself. But when I think about what my aspiration is, if I’m able to pull it off, it would be what Jerry Bruckheimer did. It would be a [” Law & Order” creator] Dick Wolf.”

In the shorter term, his contract with ESPN expires next summer and he’ll no doubt get a raise from a reported $12 million he makes now. (Smith declined to comment on his salary.) It’s difficult to find people in the industry who don’t think he’ll get to $20 million, or maybe even higher. “He is ESPN’s brand at this point,” Hannity said.

Smith’s next contract is expected to pay him more than the reported $12 million he makes now.

Matt Lauer made more than $20 million at the height of his run at the “Today” show, noted one industry source. Another industry veteran suggested that, if Smith really wanted to cash in, he would be the perfect replacement for Judge Judy, who earns around $50 million a year. Smith has mused about a late night show; he could also see himself doing “First Take” for another five or six years. “I don’t expect to get dollars from one source,” he said. “I desire to get dollars as a talent, as a production company and as an executive producer.”

Even if nothing else ever materializes, the existence of his studio makes Smith’s own independence a second bidder. His programmatic ads on YouTube, where he has more than 600,000 subscribers, are already worth seven figures annually. ESPN executives, meanwhile, have taken note of the revenue that independent shows can generate there. They had particular interest in a viral episode of Shannon Sharpe’s podcast, Club Shay Shay, that earned in the millions of dollars, according to multiple people familiar with those conversations.

There is also the matter of Pat McAfee. McAfee, the former punter-turned-WWE star-turned-ESPN host, fills the daytime slot after Smith. He is not an ESPN employee, producing his own show and selling it back to ESPN for a reported $15 million a year. Since then, Smith has been fixated on it, both the amount and the freedom it affords McAfee, according to people who have spoken with him.

The New York Post reported recently that Smith and McAfee got in a shouting match over the phone. According to people familiar with the fracas, it was over McAfee’s frustration with his depiction in a forthcoming documentary about the history of debate shows that Smith is producing for ESPN. Smith declined to comment on the alleged dispute. “I got nothing but respect for Stephen A.,” McAfee said in a text message.

“I know what all the stars in media make,” Smith said. “It has nothing to do with a network and an individual. It has everything to do with the market and the business climate because I stand to benefit from that.”

ONE AREA OF CONTENT Smith thinks he can sell is politics. He strikes a defiantly centrist pose: socially liberal, fiscally conservative, as he likes to say. He’s said he could never vote for Trump, but also stated recently on Hannity’s show that Black voters could relate to the former president because of his legal troubles.

Who, exactly, craves these opinions from Smith is unclear. The majority of his most popular YouTube videos are still sports and pop culture. Politics is also more high stakes than arguing about the virtues of Michael Jordan versus LeBron James. Those comments to Hannity prompted a rebuke from the NAACP.

“When you’re on with Hannity, it gives the impression you’re there to affirm his beliefs,” said Roland Martin, a political journalist and former CNN contributor. “And we know that Sean Hannity is absolutely against everything the NAACP stands for, so of course you get the backlash.”

“Do people care what Stephen A. has to say about politics?” Martin asked. “The reality is when you have an audience you have audience. You look at Mediate. They have had more posts in the last six months about Stephen A.’s takes on politics than what they’ve done on my show… Now Fox News is calling and [Chris] Cuomo is calling and CNN is calling. There’s a media game to this. And media loves bombastic. Media loves confrontation.”

Smith offered a version of an apology on his show for the comments to Hannity, but maintained that his forays into politics were a question of courage more than anything else. “I recognize there is an elevated level of responsibility,” he said. “But it’s also not something I shy away from. I’m not scared.”

Last year, Smith interviewed presidential candidate Chris Christie on his show and sent a message over X soliciting donations to Christie’s campaign so he could appear in a debate. “We could see the data we got from donations that people reacted to it and acted on it,” Christie said in an interview. “It was a great point of conversation with people, too. I forwarded that text to donors who hadn’t given and it moved some of those people, as well.”

Smith said he would like to have Biden and Trump on his show this election season (not to mention Barack Obama, Ted Cruz and Lindsey Graham). The candidates may consider it, too, said Adam Mendelsohn, a former advisor to Arnold Schwarzenegger and current media advisor to LeBron James.

“Politicians used to go on with Johnny Carson and Arsenio Hall, now sports is such a dominant part of popular culture,” he said. “It’s hard to deny the power of Stephen A.’s platform, and it’s not just going on the show. It’s how much it gets aggregated. So many people are teed up to aggregate whatever he does.”

Beyond media, members of both parties, Smith said, have spoken to him about running for office, including at one point for a Senate seat in Pennsylvania. “The only office that would do it for me is the presidency of the United States,” he said. “And I don’t think there’s a snowball’s chance in hell the American people would ever vote for me.”

Christie still sees it in Smith’s future. “Either party would be foolish not to be willing to talk to him,” he said. “I don’t think it’s imminent, but will he run someday? I think it’s more likely than not that he would.”

“I don’t expect to get dollars from one source,” Smith said. “I desire to get dollars as a talent, as a production company and as an executive producer.”

SMITH’S FATHER DIED A FEW YEARS AGO, and before giving the eulogy, he went to see his pastor, A.R. Bernard. As Bernard recalls, Smith wanted to go nuclear on his dad, a man who had been unfaithful to his mother and was mostly absent for his childhood.

Smith joined Bernard’s congregation, which bills itself as the largest evangelical church in New York City, some two decades ago. Bernard suggested to Smith that he temper his remarks, citing a verse from the gospel of John that urges balance between grace and truth. Smith relented.

“No doubt that he would have ripped his father apart [years ago],” Bernard said. “I was proud of him for that growth.”

Smith did not take Bernard’s advice recently when he delivered a tirade on his show about his former colleague-turned-professional antagonizer, Jason Whitlock, in which he called Whitlock a “fat piece of s—.” Naturally, it it is currently the most-viewed YouTube episode of the show’s run. “I did forgive him for it,” Bernard said.

When his mother died in 2017, Smith noticed a kindness from across the sports and media industries that he had never seen before. “All of these people out there who were customarily vicious, nobody did anything negative,” Smith said. “You couldn’t read a negative word about me. Folks’ humanity came shining through.”

It helped him understand that he could show more of himself on the air, part of a journey that has led to the SpongeBob bit, or talking shop about Latinas. “When he waxes poetic about relationships, sex or things you never imagined that Stephen A. had opinions on, it amuses me immensely,” said Jemele Hill, a writer for The Atlantic and Smith’s former ESPN colleague. “And I’m here for the after-dark content. I think it makes him seem more real to people.”

Conveniently, Smith realized, it’s also a good way to go viral. Whatever his exact ambitions, the metrics seem most important to him, in part because they give him control of his career. But it also makes the size of the audience the goal unto itself.

On a table off to the side of his studio were a group of balloons, including three large purple ones: a 5 and two zeros that commemorated the show’s 500,000 YouTube subscribers.

“They brought that out here, but I didn’t ask for it,” Smith said. “I’ll be happy when we hit a million.”