Woke Off: Malika Andrews Tops Stephen A. In Battle Over Victimhood In Ime Udoka Suspension
Stephen A. Smith duked it out on Friday morning with Malika Andrews over the suspension of Boston Celtics head coach Ime Udoka.
Thursday, the Celtics suspended Udoka for a year for violations of team policies. The Athletic reports that Udoka had an improper intimate relationship with a female staffer, to whom he made unwanted comments.
Smith saw the suspension as an opportunity to gain cred with the woke wing of sports media. He alleges, without citing any examples, that sports teams only allow white coaches to have inappropriate relationships with staffers.
However, Smith got a bit reckless during his race-bait. While the woke initially supported his angle, he then angered them as he called for the NBA to name the women with whom Udoka was romantically involved:
https://twitter.com/OutkickDanZ/status/1573372495536988161?s=20&t=FJnvQn2YHLkjg0ArJhA0gA
It gets dicey when a host makes the culture warriors choose between a suspended black coach and a woman. The pyramid of victimhood does not separate these two groups.
And that's why Stephen A. Smith got a call from ESPN NBA Today host Malika Andrews, who never misses an opportunity to express outrage. Andrews called into "First Take" to tell Smith to "stop" pointing fingers and get his facts straight:
https://twitter.com/ClutchPointsApp/status/1573340866416082944
Smith didn't appreciate Andrews coming on his show, as he emphasized, to debate him. Smith made clear when he kicked Max Kellerman off that guests shall never challenge his shallow intellect.
He warned Andrews not to let it happen again:
https://twitter.com/ClutchPointsApp/status/1573342653101625344
Objectively, Andrews won the Woke Off. Let us break it down, step by step:
First, teams and corporations do not let superiors have improper relationships with subordinates if they have white skin. Smith didn't provide any examples of this claim because examples are contradictory to his fallacy.
May we point him to the University of Arkansas firing white guy Bobby Petrino as the head football coach for hooking up with a department staffer?
Second, Smith conveniently left out that Udoka made uncomfortable and unwanted comments toward the woman, per the report in The Athletic.
Now, why didn't he mention that? Does he not know all of the facts, as Andrews says? Or is he trying to protect Udoka, as his actions suggest?
Third, Smith is wrong to pressure the Celtics into revealing the name of the woman. By all accounts, she's an underling who does not have the platform to defend herself. She doesn't have the reach to respond to Smith defending Udoka's role in what reports suggest is an unbalanced power dynamic between a head coach and an inferior.
Finally, Smith argues that the Celtics could have suspended Udoka without revealing why. Um, what?
Does he think no one would have noticed a coach missing an entire season? Does Smith believe rampant speculation about a coach's year-long absence is a less distracting route?
That argument is as foolish as his race-bait.
Pandering to the woke works only so long as you don't alienate another victim group along the way. Stephen A. Smith is still learning the rules. After all, he only decided sometime this summer he no longer wanted to be an independent, original voice but a purveyor of groupthink. He wasn't like this six months ago.
Smith is now a sheep. And a 27-year-old, often uninformed, sheep just embarrassed him on his own show.
Call it When Race-Baiting Goes Wrong.