Does Katt Williams’ interview expose Stephen A. Smith as a fraud?

It’s difficult to adequately summarize the three-hour attack comedian Katt Williams unleashed on the entertainment industry earlier this week.

Williams carpet-bombed so many big names and spent so much time riding third rails that interviewer Shannon Sharpe authentically wondered whether any high-profile Hollywood guests would return to his popular podcast “Club Shay Shay.”

The elimination of merit directly connects to the pandemic of lies plaguing our country.

Williams proclaimed the year 2024 as the year of truth.

“All people that love the truth got to be happy if the truth is coming out and lies are getting exposed. That's just what time it is 2024,” he declared after taking major swipes at Diddy, T.D. Jakes, Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Hart, Steve Harvey, Chris Tucker, Cedric the Entertainer, Ludacris, and the “Illuminati” and insinuating major stars are controlled through sexual malfeasance.

Williams argued that the entertainers at the top of the comedic industry don’t advance through hard work and talent. Rather, they rise and fall based on their entrance into secret alliances and willingness to promote the messages Hollywood elites dictate. He leveled his most direct criticism at comedian Kevin Hart.

“Have we heard of a comedian that came to L.A., and in the first year in L.A., he had his own sitcom on network television and had his own film called ‘Soul Plane’ that he was leading? No. We’ve never heard of that before that person or since that person. What do you think a plant is?”

Williams ripped Steve Harvey for promoting a false personal narrative about being homeless. Williams claimed Cedric the Entertainer stole a joke from him. Williams referenced Chris Tucker’s association with sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. Williams said the Illuminati promised Ludacris $200 million and a light-skinned wife.

By the time the tiny comedian mentioned reading 3,000 books a year as a child, being qualified for college at age 7, and running a 4.3 40-yard dash as a junior-high football player, the average listener was likely overwhelmed and a bit unsure what to believe.

Here’s what you should believe: the people at the top of the influence industries — arts, entertainment, media, academia, and politics — have been installed by a small handful of elite powerbrokers.

Merit has been eliminated from American culture. That’s what Katt Williams was really complaining about. The tiny comedian believes he has superior talent, work ethic, insight, and integrity to many of his more-celebrated peers. He’s frustrated that American culture has become so corrupt and controlled that obvious, blatant lies pass for infallible truths.

Journalists are supposed to be truth-tellers. Now, we’re nothing more than entertainers and co-conspirators in the lies being foisted on the public.

Many of us can relate to his frustration. The elimination of merit directly connects to the pandemic of lies plaguing our country. The people at the top of the influence industries must support the following lies or face ridicule as bigots, homophobes, anti-Semites, transphobes, sellouts, coons, and misogynists:

Diversity is America’s strength.

We must implement racism to fix racism.

Biological men should compete against women in sports.

The vaccine prevents COVID.

“All lives matter” is racist.

Child mutilation is “gender-affirming care.”

Gender dysphoria is not a mental illness.

Abortion is health care.

Traditional Christianity is racist.

America is systemically racist.

The patriarchy is evil.

American secular Jews do not have enormous power in Hollywood or in the media.

January 6 was “an insurrection.”

Trump supporters are racists.

Racism caused George Floyd’s death, not years of drug abuse and resisting arrest.

That’s at least 15 lies you must support or ignore in order to avoid character assassination in modern American culture.

No wonder Katt Williams is angry. No wonder he spent three hours calling out his peers. Comedians are supposed to be truth-tellers. They’re supposed to point out the lies prevalent in society, not provide cover for them.

I can relate to every bit of Katt Williams’ angst. He realizes George Carlin will likely be jailed in 2024. I feel the exact same way about Mike Royko, my journalism hero. Journalists are supposed to be truth-tellers. Now, we’re nothing more than entertainers and co-conspirators in the lies being foisted on the public.

Stephen A. Smith is the Kevin Hart of the sports media. Smith is a plant. Disney and ESPN installed Smith at the top of sports media because his inadequacies as a journalist make him easy to control.

When I listened to Katt Williams talk about Kevin Hart and Steve Harvey, my mind immediately drifted to Smith’s memoir. Smith’s story doesn’t add up.

When you don’t earn a position, your loyalties go to the handlers who installed you. It’s why Harvard chose Claudine Gay, why Joe Biden chose Ketanji Brown-Jackson and Kamala Harris, and why the music industry celebrates rap and the talentless hacks willing to rhyme the N-word every 10 seconds and brag about the color and flexibility of their booty and other privates.

Let me return to Smith. Last year, I publicly feuded with Smith, the host of ESPN’s “First Take” program. He repeatedly referred to me as “fat bastard.” The barbs tickled me. They also made me take an even deeper interest in how someone with such limited journalistic skills became the face of the worldwide leader in sports.

Smith released a memoir in 2023 called “Straight Shooter.” I read it. It’s farcical.

When I listened to Katt Williams talk about Kevin Hart and Steve Harvey, my mind immediately drifted to Smith’s memoir. Smith’s story doesn’t add up.

He (or his ghostwriter) claims he received a full basketball scholarship from Winston-Salem State after a one-day tryout in February 1988. A former Winston-Salem State basketball player allegedly drove Smith from New York to North Carolina for the tryout after Smith impressed the former player during a one-on-one matchup on a playground court. According to his book, Smith arrived on campus on a Saturday, checked into a hotel, and woke up Sunday morning to participate in a scrimmage.

Before I go farther, let me add that Smith played one year of high school basketball. He rode the bench for the 1985-86 Thomas Edison High team as a senior. In the book, he says his one season of prep basketball ended abruptly when he failed a single assignment in a single class. He didn’t fail the class. He failed an assignment and was removed from the team.

After his abbreviated high school career, Smith matriculated to Fashion Institute of Technology College of New York. It’s a school for women and men interested in joining the fashion industry. Smith enrolled so he could play on FIT’s junior college basketball team.

He rode the bench at FIT, too. In his book, Smith described a work, school, basketball, and commute schedule that sounded humanly impossible.

So, after riding the bench in high school for a year, riding the bench at a junior college for a year, and impressing an old player on a New York playground, Smith earned a tryout in front of Winston-Salem State’s legendary coach Clarence “Big House” Gaines. And this tryout happened on a Sunday, at the end of the regular season.

Not many college teams hold scrimmages on a Sunday, one day after playing an important regular season game on a Saturday. But that’s how important it was for Big House to get a glimpse of a 6-foot-1, 150-pound guard with no high school or junior college accomplishments.

According to Smith’s account, he knocked down 17 straight shots in the scrimmage, and Big House offered him a full scholarship immediately after the practice.

This is laughable. In Big House’s own memoir, he frequently complained about his limited budget at WSSU. The historically black Division II program was not flush with cash and a dozen scholarships to toss around. We’re supposed to believe that Gaines gave one to a frail kid he saw play for an hour?

I cannot appropriately do justice to the far-fetched story Smith painted in “Straight Shooter.” Smith has struggled to explain it on national TV. In November 2022, on the set of “NBA Countdown” with Malia Andrews, Jalen Rose, and J.J. Redick, ESPN ran a graphic of Smith, Rose, and Redick’s senior year stats. Smith allegedly averaged 1.5 points per game. He said he scored so few points because he played in just one game after a knee injury.

You can’t average 1.5 points in one game. It’s impossible.

In August 2023, on his podcast show, Smith backtracked and said he never played a single game at WSSU. It’s a bizarre contention, especially considering Smith is listed on a 1991 WSSU stat sheet as having played nine games.

Is that a different Stephen Smith?

Smith’s entire existence at WSSU is weird. His “First Take” show has traveled back to the campus at least twice. But we’ve never been shown more than one picture of Smith at the school. It’s a standard headshot for a game-day program. There are no action shots of Smith as a player. Nothing from him socializing with his friends on campus. Smith’s memoir doesn’t feature a single picture.

The face of ESPN wrote a memoir, and I can’t find a legitimate review of it from any major or small publication. Smith pals around with a handful of former WSSU teammates — Gary Stephens, Phil Hayes, and Marc Turner — who appear to comprise the shortest college basketball team in history. It’s weird.

So is the woman who has appeared on “First Take” as Smith’s former college professor, Marilyn “Mama” Roseboro. She’s listed in old yearbooks and newspaper accounts as a special assistant to the chancellor. Her public interviews with Smith paint the picture she taught him. Maybe she doubled as a professor.

Smith’s memoir raises far more questions than answers about how he became the top personality in sports media. You read it, and Smith feels like a gimmick, a plant. You read it, and you realize Claudine Gay makes perfect sense. You read it, and you think Katt Williams is telling the truth about the entertainment industry.

Smith either supports or remains silent on all 15 of the lies.