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Dak Prescott being carted off the field after hurting his leg in a divisional game against the NY Giants

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Dak Prescott: Where will he play next year?

This week on First Take, Stephen A and Max debated over many issues in the sports world including the Super Bowl, Tom Brady, and the NBA MVP of the league so far. However, one topic especially stood out to me, the discussion about Dak Prescott and where his future in the NFL as a franchise quarterback is going to be. Stephen A, after analyzing the situation and comments Dak has made regarding the situation, believes that Dak will stay in Dallas after all. This past season has caused some chaos in the Cowboys quarterback situation, Dak ultimately being franchise tagged after the Cowboys front office was not willing to give their star quarterback the contract he wanted. Now this season, he played a few games, and then faced a devastating leg injury, requiring surgery and eventually sidelining Prescott for the rest of the season. Without Dak, the Cowboys struggled, and in a disappointing season, missed the playoffs yet again. Stephen A uses this fact as the main reason to why the Cowboys will ultimately sign Dak to the contract he wants and keep him for years to come, saying that without him, “The Cowboys crumpled like a cheap tent.” Stephen A also makes the claim that Dak doesn’t want to go anywhere, after he posted a picture on his Instagram story of him and his teammate Blake Jarwin saying that he wants to run it back with the tight end. Personally, I would like to see what Dak can do with this offense and all the weapons he’s got in a full season, after he looked like an MVP type player last year before he hurt his leg. 

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First Take clip on YouTube from Friday morning, before the game on Sunday

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Ravens or Titans: Who advances?

Even the smartest and most intelligent of reporters are wrong sometimes. That statement doesn’t exclude Stephen A Smith. Stephen A picked the Titans over the Ravens on Sunday the main reason being the efforts of Derrick Henry the 2000-yard rushing running back on the Tennessee Titans. However, Steven A was wrong. It is currently 5:20 PM on Sunday evening and the Ravens have defeated the Titans by a score of 23-13. not only did the Ravens slow down the Titans offense, but they completely shut down Derrick Henry, holding him to only 40 yards rushing, one of the worst performances of his career. this came as a shock to some people, including Stephen A, because last year the Titans defeated the Ravens in the playoffs, and the Titans beat the Ravens in the regular season this year in week 11, and in both games, Derrick Henry rushed for over 100 yards and lead their offense to victory. Stephen A's partner on first take, Max Kellerman, argued that Steven was wrong, and that Lamar Jackson and the Ravens would prevail and defeat the Titans in the wild card game. Max ended up being right and I can't wait to hear Max glow about his victory on Monday when the show resumes.

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Stephen A on FirstTake

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Who is more valuable? Stephen A takes Aaron Rodgers over Patrick Mahomes

When the moderator of First Take Molly Qerim asked Stephen A who was more valuable to their respective teams; Aaron Rodgers to the Green Bay Packers or Patrick Mahomes to the Kansas City Chiefs, Stephen A said that Aaron Rodgers was the more valuable player. Stephen A listed some statistics that shine Rodgers in a good light, such as his 69% pass completion percentage, his 36-4 TD-INT ratio, and how he has had very few first round WR draft picks. Even this year in the 2020 NFL draft, the packers had a late first round pick, yet chose to draft a backup QB t eventually take over for Rodgers, rather than drafting him a WR to help his offense NOW. He also mentioned how Aaron Rodgers is a great QB talent and maybe the best QB he’s ever seen with his own two eyes, the only QB rivaling his case being Patrick Mahomes who to Stephen A hasn’t played long enough in the league to be deemed better than Aaron Rodgers already. However, he does believe that one day Mahomes will surpass Rodgers as the MOST talented QB in NFL history. Stephen A lemented on the fact that Aaron Rodgers hasn’t been given many 1st round WRs to throw to. He does this by comparing Aaron to other current all time great QBs such as Tom Brady and Drew Brees who have thrown passes and TDs to very many different 1st round WR talents such as Michael Thomas of the saints and Randy Moss of the patriots.

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HC Doug Pederson speaking to QB Carson Wentz

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Blog Post #3: November 17

Carson Wentz, QB for the NFC East leading Philadelphia Eagles, has received lots of negative media and attention for his quarterback play this season. Carson Wentz, despite never have playing in an NFL playoff game before, received a contract over the summer worth over 125 million dollars for 4 years, equaling around 32 million dollars per year. This is a lot of money obviously to make, but even for a football QB, Wentz makes more money than anybody else in the league except for 7 other QBs, basically crowning him with the title of an elite QB. However, despite this big contract, and near MVP season in 2017-18 before he got hurt, Wentz has played horribly this season, with his Eagles sitting at 3-5-1 on the year so far, having just lost to the 2-win NY Giants. Stephen A argues that Wentz isn’t the problem on the Eagles, and instead it’s the coaching staff, specifically HC Doug Pederson, and the organization as a whole who have struggled over the past couple of years to support Wentz with good, healthy weapons on the offensive side of the ball. Stephen A’s counterpart on the show, Max Kellerman, argues the opposite, saying how Carson Wentz should be able to make up for the Eagles lack of offensive threats and offensive line due to his massive contract taking money away from signing other big-name players in free agency. It seems to be a little bit of both, Carson’s fault and the organization’s fault for their lack of success this season in a historically bad division, however, the statistics and eye ball test definitely don’t favor or vouch for Carson’s play this year.

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Blog Post #2: October 21

I always look forward to tuning into channel 36 (ESPN) every Tuesday morning at 10AM, because I especially enjoy listening to Stephen A on first take on this day. Tuesday marks the end of a football week, concluding the Thursday night game, Sunday games, and Monday night game. At the end of every week of football, Stephen A updates his “Stephen A’s List,” which is just a football power rankings of the current top 5 teams in the league so far in the season. This week, Stephen A removed the Green Bay Packers from the #1 spot and out of the top 5 after losing in embarrassing fashion to the Tom Brady led Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and replaced them with the Tennessee Titans, who last week were only #5 on his list. Stephen A, as did the whole world watching the Titans vs. Texans game on Sunday, saw a team do whatever they wanted on the offensive side of the ball, led by a dominate performance by 6′3″ RB Derrick Henry, who finished the game with over total yards and 2 TDs. The Titans, however, didn’t play the best defense, allowing Deshaun Watson and the struggling Houston Texans, who just fired their coach and GM Bill O’Brien after a rough start to the 2020-21 season, to drop 36 points on them, the game being an offensive battle from the start. I do not believe the Titans deserve to be #1 over teams such as the Kansas City Chiefs (5-1), and Seattle Seahawks (5-0), however the Titans have played extremely well this season, and their whole organization deserves great recognition for that. The #2-4 teams on the list are 2) Seattle Seahawks (5-0), 3) KC Chiefs (5-1), 4) Baltimore Ravens (5-1), and 5) Stephen A’s favorite football team, the Pittsburgh Steelers (5-0).

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Stephen A. Smith and Sports Reporting

Stephen A. Smith, a sports reporter and analyst for ESPN, is an African American male who takes part in many sport reporting activities, one major one being First Take. First Take is a morning show on ESPN, usually aired between the hours of 10am - noon (EST time), with 2 other main members Molly Qerim and Max Kellerman, Molly being the moderator of the show, and Max being Stephen A’s debate partner. It’s crazy to me how the two have such different opinions on certain topics, sometimes it makes me think that one of the two is just lying to make the show entertaining because when the two argue, especially Stephen A, it makes for a HILARIOUS morning show. I chose to talk about Stephen A rather than Max Kellerman or any other sports analyst because not only do I agree with most of Stephen A’s opinions on the show, he is also an idol for many young African American kids who aspire to be like Stephen A and pursue careers in the sports world. Recently, Stephen A made his NBA finals prediction for the 2020 series between the Miami Heat and the Los Angeles Lakers, predicting that the Lakers would take the series in five or six games. This is because the Lakers have the two best players of the two teams, LeBron James and Anthony Davis, and since basketball is a 5v5 game, 2 players matter more than for example in football, where it’s 11v11 at a time. Therefore, 2 players will have a greater impact on the game in a 5v5 setting rather than a 11v11 setting.