Watch: Stephen A. Smith Responds to Backlash Over His Serena Williams Halftime Comments
Stephen A. Smith isn’t backing down.
After sparking backlash following his comments about Serena Williams’ surprise cameo alongside Kendrick Lamar at the Super Bowl halftime show the First Take host clarified his comments.
“Please go back and look at exactly what I said,” Stephen wrote in response to a critic on X, formerly, Twitter. “I was talking overall from a man’s perspective—highlighting what most men would think. I didn’t utter a single disrespectful word about Serena. No issues with folks getting upset of literal serious stuff one’s pissed about. This doesn’t qualify peeps. Come on.”
Making sure the world knew it was in jest, the sports commentator added, “We were joking around on @FirstTake. Damn y’all! It’s not that serious.”
Serena surprised the world during the Super Bowl Feb. 9 when she appeared on stage doing the Crip Walk while Kendrick performed his Drake diss track, “Not Like Us.”
Following the performance, Stephen suggested that the Grand Slam champion’s husband Alexis Ohanian end their marriage, because she he took part in bashing Drake—whom she dated briefly in 2015—on the world stage.
“If I’m your husband, I’m thinking, ‘Why are you up there trolling him—trolling your ex?’” Stephen posited during a Feb. 10 episode of the First Take podcast. “If I’m married, and my wife is going to troll her ex—go back to his ass. Because clearly you don’t belong with me. What you worried about him for—and you with me?”
Emilee Chinn / Staff / GETTY IMAGES
However, Alexis, who wed Serena in 2017, was all praise and no worries when it came to his wife’s big moment writing on X Feb. 9, “Pretty fantastic halftime show.”
And he later highlighted the meaning—beyond her Drake connection—of dancing in the show.
“Some of y’all have no idea how criticized Serena was for this same dance at Wimbledon 13 years ago and it shows….” the Reddit cofounder shared the following day. “This is bigger than the music.”
For her part, Serena—who is the mom of daughters Alexis Olympia, 7, and Adira, 16 months—celebrated her moment on the turf writing, “Let’s go Super Bowl halftime. I died a little!”
Keep reading to see more stars who attended the Super Bowl…
