Stephen A. Smith, who often passionately defends his New York Knicks fandom, touted the performance of guard Quentin Grimes while praising the Knicks during a Monday episode of his YouTube show … but the Knicks traded Grimes away months ago.
“I’m looking at Grimes, he’s looked good. I’m looking at [Knicks center Isaiah] Hartenstein, as a reserve, giving you activity off the bench,” Smith stated, confidently, during his Monday episode of the “Stephen A. Smith Show.”
The Knicks traded Grimes, along with guards Malachi Flynn, Evan Fournier and Ryan Arcidiacono to the Detroit Pistons in February in return for Bojan Bogdanović and Alec Burks. Smith covered the trade on his show when it happened.
Smith, who proclaims his Knicks fandom far and wide, may have been making an honest mistake. My guess would be that he was actually trying to talk about guard Miles McBride, who has stepped up big time to fill in for some of New York’s injured stars.
But honest mistake or not, that didn’t stop NBA Twitter from absolutely clowning on him. (RELATED: Iconic Sports Analyst Stephen A. Smith Says He’s ‘Ashamed’ Of Democrats, Might Vote For A Bunch Of Republicans)
One user joked that Smith would make the same mistake if talking about the New York Jets.
“Producer: “Stephen A. talk about the Jets” Stephen A: “I’m LOOKIN at Geno Smith, he’s looked good. I’m LOOKIN at Aaron Rodgers, great season last year,” Julian MacGurn tweeted.
Producer: “Stephen A. talk about the Jets”
Stephen A: “I’m LOOKIN at Geno Smith, he’s looked good. I’m LOOKIN at Aaron Rodgers, great season last year” pic.twitter.com/psrmpgRWgs— Julian MacGurn (@JulianMacgurn) April 9, 2024
But even if the Grimes blunder was just a slip of the tongue, his characterization of Hartenstein as a reserve is also somewhat misleading. Hartenstein has started 46 of the 72 games he’s played in this year, including the Knicks last two contests.
All this leads me to ask the question, does Stephen A. even watch the Knicks? I know he’s a busy guy, and as a sports writer myself I know how hard it is to faithfully follow one single team while trying to cover the entire landscape for a national audience… but come on bro. You can’t be this wrong and still call yourself such a massive fanatic. Bad look Stephen A., bad look.