Stephen A. Smith
Stephen A. Smith is the American sports commentator who anchors ESPN's First Take and has become the most visible, and most highly paid, on-air personality in American sports media. He signed a five-year ESPN deal worth more than $100 million in 2025, plus a three-year, $36 million SiriusXM radio agreement, after starting out as a newspaper reporter covering the Philadelphia 76ers.
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Where does Stephen A. Smith live?
He lives in North Caldwell, New Jersey, a suburb about 30 kilometres west of Manhattan, which keeps him inside commuting distance of ESPN's New York studios where First Take is produced. He was born in the Bronx and grew up in Hollis, Queens. Source: Wikipedia.
What is Stephen A. Smith's nationality?
He is American, born in New York City. His parents were immigrants from the US Virgin Islands, and he was raised in the Hollis section of Queens as the youngest of six children. Source: Wikipedia.
How old is Stephen A. Smith?
He was born on October 14, 1967, which makes him 58 years old in September 2026. He turns 59 in October. Source: Wikipedia.
How tall is Stephen A. Smith?
He is generally listed at around 6 ft 1 in (about 185 cm). He played college basketball as a guard at Winston-Salem State, so the figure is in the plausible range, though broadcaster heights are rarely documented as precisely as athletes'.
How much does Stephen A. Smith make?
His ESPN contract, signed in 2025, is worth more than $100 million over five years, which works out at roughly $20 million a year and makes him the highest-paid on-air talent in the network's history. On top of that he signed a three-year, $36 million deal with SiriusXM in 2025 for radio work covering sport and current affairs. Sources: Wikipedia, NBC News.
What is Stephen A. Smith known for?
First Take, ESPN's weekday morning debate show, which he has anchored since 2012 and which is built almost entirely around his delivery: long, escalating monologues, frequent superlatives and a willingness to take a position and defend it for a full segment. He is also an executive producer on the show. Sources: ESPN, Wikipedia.
Did Stephen A. Smith play basketball?
Yes, at Winston-Salem State University, a historically Black university in North Carolina, where he played guard under the legendary coach Clarence 'Big House' Gaines. He graduated in 1991 with a degree in mass communication, and has said Gaines pushed him toward journalism rather than a playing career. Source: Wikipedia.
How did Stephen A. Smith start his career?
In newspapers. After graduating in 1991 he wrote for the Winston-Salem Journal, the Greensboro News and Record and the New York Daily News, then spent most of the period from 1994 to 2010 at the Philadelphia Inquirer, where he covered the 76ers and became a general sports columnist. He joined ESPN in 2003 while still writing. Source: Wikipedia.
Is Stephen A. Smith still on NBA Countdown?
No. ESPN reworked the NBA Countdown lineup for the 2025-26 season and he was not part of it. That change did not affect his role on First Take, which remains his primary show and the anchor of his contract. Sources: ESPN, Yahoo Sports.
Is Stephen A. Smith married?
He is not married. He has two daughters and has spoken publicly about raising them, but he keeps his family life largely out of his broadcasting. Source: Wikipedia.
Has Stephen A. Smith written a book?
Yes, Straight Shooter: A Memoir of Second Chances and First Takes, published in 2023. It covers his childhood in Queens, his college years, his firing from ESPN in 2009 and his return, and a serious health scare. It was a New York Times bestseller. Source: Wikipedia.
Was Stephen A. Smith ever fired by ESPN?
Yes. His first run at the network ended in 2009, when ESPN did not renew him after his show Quite Frankly with Stephen A. Smith was cancelled. He spent time back in print and on radio, then returned to ESPN in 2011 and was made a permanent First Take fixture in 2012. He has written about that gap as the turning point of his career. Source: Wikipedia.
What is The Stephen A. Smith Show?
It is the radio and podcast strand he has carried under various forms since 2005, starting on ESPN Radio's WEPN in New York. His 2025 SiriusXM agreement extends the same format, with sport as the base but a broader brief that includes current affairs. Sources: Wikipedia, Yahoo News.
Why is Stephen A. Smith so famous?
Because ESPN built its morning schedule around him and the format rewards exactly what he does. Debate television needs someone who will commit to a take on camera every day without hedging, and he has done it five mornings a week for more than a decade. The result is that his contract is measured against athletes' salaries rather than journalists'. Sources: ESPN, NBC News.
Stephen A. Smith is the most recognisable voice in American sports television, and the numbers that describe his job now look more like a player’s than a reporter’s. His 2025 ESPN contract runs five years and is worth more than $100 million, roughly $20 million a year, the largest deal the network has given an on-air personality. A separate three-year, $36 million agreement with SiriusXM covers his radio work. That is an unusual place to land for someone who started out on a newspaper beat.
He was born in the Bronx on October 14, 1967, the youngest of six children of parents who had come from the US Virgin Islands, and grew up in Hollis, Queens. He played guard at Winston-Salem State University under Clarence “Big House” Gaines, one of the winningest coaches in college basketball history, and graduated in 1991 with a degree in mass communication. The story he tells is that Gaines steered him away from chasing a playing career and toward writing about the game instead.
The writing came first and lasted a long time. He worked at the Winston-Salem Journal, the Greensboro News and Record and the New York Daily News before joining the Philadelphia Inquirer, where from 1994 he covered the 76ers and later wrote as a general sports columnist. He arrived at ESPN in 2003, lost his place there in 2009 when his show was cancelled and his contract was not renewed, and came back in 2011. He has called that gap the most useful thing that ever happened to him, and it forms the spine of his 2023 memoir, Straight Shooter, which reached the New York Times bestseller list.
Since 2012 the job has been First Take, ESPN’s weekday morning debate programme, which he anchors and executive produces. The format asks for a firm position, delivered at length, every single morning, and he supplies it. ESPN reworked its NBA Countdown lineup for the 2025-26 season without him, a change that made headlines but left First Take, and the contract built around it, untouched.
He lives in North Caldwell, New Jersey, within reach of the New York studios, and has two daughters. At 58 he is in the middle of the longest and most lucrative deal of a career that has now lasted more than three decades, most of it spent arguing about basketball in public.
