Stephen A. Smith clearly has a hard time owning up to his mistakes.
The ESPN personality Smith made a bad error during Friday’s episode of “First Take.” While previewing this weekend’s AFC title game between the New England Patriots and the Denver Broncos, Smith gave a mention to Patriots defensive coordinator Terrell Williams and credited Williams for New England’s top-five defense this year.
There was a big problem with Smith’s take though — Williams has been on leave from the Patriots for virtually the entire season. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer several months ago and has been away from the team since Sept. 10 (days after New England’s regular season opener). Zak Kuhr has been serving as the Patriots’ interim defensive coordinator over that span instead.
Exhibit #41,284 of national sports talk hosts being clueless.
— Kleaver (@KleaverSports) January 23, 2026
Stephen A Smith thinks Terrell Williams has been coaching the Patriots defense all year. Terrell Williams has been battling prostate cancer and Zak Kuhr has been the interim DC almost the entire season. https://t.co/593RhDT5DN pic.twitter.com/DkiGHEFGfY
In a post to his X page on Friday night, Smith somehow decided to double down on his awful mistake.
“Nice try!” wrote Smith. “First of all, we reported earlier in the year that [Williams] was out due to Prostate Cancer when it happened. Secondly, he still talks to coaches for game-planning purposes.
“Thirdly, forgetting to mention all of that is different than not knowing,” Smith wrote. “Plus it really doesn’t matter when I’ve got experts like Ryan Clark and Cam backing me up. But keep pushing the story. Hope it gets the clicks folks want. Carry on!”
Nice try!
— Stephen A Smith (@stephenasmith) January 24, 2026
First of all, we reported earlier in the year that he was out due to Prostate Cancer when it happened. Secondly, he still talks to coaches for game-planning purposes. Thirdly, forgetting to mention all of that is different than not knowing — plus it really doesn’t… https://t.co/fHWDn3ZlOQ
That was certainly quite the exercise in mental gymnastics from Smith. Effectively, he was saying that he did not make a mistake … and that if he did make a mistake, that it was justified … and that if his mistake wasn’t justified, then it didn’t really matter anyway.
It is fair to say that Williams likely has still had some role in shaping New England’s defense this season. But with Williams having to take an understandably major step back from his duties to recover, it is completely disingenuous to suggest that he alone should be credited for the team’s defensive success (without even a single mention of the excellent work that Kuhr has done).
Unfortunately though, these kinds of self-created spectacles are all too on-brand for Smith. That might have been even worse than the embarrassing “Charlie Kirk” tongue slip that Smith had on the air a couple of weeks ago.
