After several weeks away with a serious case of COVID-19, Stephen A. Smith returned to ‘First Take’ and gave a public service announcement about his experiences with the virus, in addition to his inevitable trolling of the Dallas Cowboys and their fans.
Smith explained that he was hospitalized over New Years, and that he didn’t know if he was going to make it.
“For me personally, it hit me differently,” he said.
Smith tested positive in mid-December but it really hit him right before his hospitalization.
“You’re assuming that you’ll have a fever, might have a cough, gonna have that massive headache — but you’ll get over it,” he said. “In a lot of cases that was the case. In my case it was totally different.
“I had 103 degree fever every night. Woke up with chills and a pool of sweat. Headaches were massive. Coughing profusely. And it got to a point where right before New Year’s Eve, I was in the hospital into New Year’s Day. That’s how I brought in the New Year.”
He said that his doctors told him he would have died had he not been vaccinated.
“They told me, had I not been vaccinated, I wouldn’t be here. That’s how bad it was. I had pneumonia in both lungs. My liver was bad. It had ravaged me to the point where even now I have monitor my volume — get to the gym every day, walk before you run. Work your way back because I’m still not 100 percent with my lungs, but I’m COVID negative. I’m on the road to recovery.
“But if it wasn’t for several doctors, I wouldn’t be here. Love and respect for what they did. Love and respect for people in the sports community and ESPN executives for checking on me every single day. Dave Roberts, Norby Williamson, Jimmy Pitaro — I can’t thank you enough.”
Smith advocated for people to wear masks to protect others.
“Everybody’s different, he said. “My sister smokes and she had COVID and she was fine in 3-4 days. Me? I don’t smoke and it almost took me out.
“I think the one thing to emphasize the importance of, no matter how you feel about the vaccine, that mask is important. The reason why the mask is so important is you don’t know how the next person is affected. How I’m affected is different from you are affected.
Smith was profoundly excited to be back on television.
“I’m ecstatic to be back. I’ve missed being at work. I’ve used more sick days in the last month than I’ve used in my 28-year career in this business combined. I don’t take many sick days, but I had to do it this month just to survive. And I can’t tell you how lucky and sincerely blessed I am to be sitting here today — because two-and-a-half, three weeks ago, I didn’t know if I was gonna make it.”
And, of course, it wouldn’t be a day after the Cowboys’ season ended if he did not take a moment to troll the organization and its fans in a video he posted to Twitter where he claimed that Dallas fans “deserved” to be “miserable” after the Cowboys’ loss in the Wild Card round.
It’s great to have him back.