Former NBA star Stephen Jackson has criticized Stephen A. Smith over his handling of Alexis Ohanian pressing him about his comments about Serena Williams appearing during Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl Halftime Show.
Ohanian recently pressed Smith during an appearance on First Take, and suggested that he shouldn’t be making comments about a topic he knows nothing about, which was, in this case, marriage. On his eponymous podcast, Smith stood by his comments about Williams’ cameo during K Dot’s performance, but said that he has “nothing” against Ohanian and he respects him for playfully confronting him about it.
In a post shared on his Instagram Stories, Jackson chimed in on the whole situation. He contrasted the way that Smith talks about LeBron James and Serena Williams to his more “respectful” approach to Ohanian, and made it clear he wouldn’t vote for Smith if he were to get into politics, which Smith hinted at as recently as August.
“Come on, Stephen A., bro. You get loud and all in your feelings about Bron. When talking to a Black billionaire, but when you talking to a white billionaire, you humble,” Jackson said, as seen in the clip below. “And you come back on your show talking real respectful, mild-mannered… Right, bro, listen. And you talking to Black woman? Stay out of politics and stick to talking about sports you never played, alright? Just stick to doing that bro. We’re not gonna vote for you. I heard you talking about running, don’t do that, bro. We’re not gonna vote for you. No. No, no, no. We’re not. … You do not have the same energy for other people, but you got a lot of energy for Bron and Black women and not everybody else, stop it.”
When addressing the moment in which Ohanian pressed him live on air, Smith explained that he wouldn’t like to see his wife trolling an alleged ex-boyfriend if he were in that situation. “If that was my wife, I don’t want to see that,” he said. “He is her husband, he loves her dearly. They have two wonderful children together, and I have absolutely no issue with him whatsoever with him wanting to address that situation with me.”
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