Stephen A. Smith Reveals Why He Didn’t Confront LeBron James: “It Might Affect My Money”

Mandatory Credit: Trevor Ruszkowski-USA TODAY SportsIt has been well over a year since LeBron James confronted Stephen A. Smith in March 2025 during a game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the New York Knicks, and the ESPN analyst still won’t stop talking about it. Smith recently said he was ending his beef with LeBron, but he once again spoke about that infamous confrontation on The KG & Stephen A. Show.“It is the night ESPN had just announced my new contract,” Smith said. “That day, that day. I go to the game that night, and I’m there in the first quarter chilling. It’s the third quarter during the timeout, and I’m talking. I turn around… He’s like, ‘Yeah, you need to chill out. You f***ing with my son. That’s my son. That’s f***ed.” I said, ‘Yo.’ I said, ‘We could talk after the game. I’ll wait.'”LeBron, who was playing for the Lakers at the time, wasn’t interested in listening to Smith, though, and kept at it. The 41-year-old had taken issue with comments the analyst made about him and his son Bronny James in January.Smith had pleaded with LeBron as a father to stop the Bronny experiment in the NBA. The younger James was struggling massively in his rookie season after the Lakers selected him with the No. 55 pick in the 2024 NBA Draft. It was widely believed they selected Bronny only to please LeBron, who had often spoken about wanting to play with his son. His struggles gave credence to the notion.Now, Bronny had already faced a lot of criticism at that point, and while LeBron might not have been happy about that, he had mostly kept his mouth shut. The 22-time All-Star thought Smith got personal with the father talk, though. So, LeBron felt compelled to confront him to protect his household. Smith claimed here that he wanted to go at the NBA icon in response, but didn’t want to risk losing his money.“Remember, it’s the first day of my new contract,” Smith said. “So, I’m going like this, ‘If I get into some s*** right now, it might affect my money.’… I wanted to confront him, but I knew it was going to be a problem. I knew it was gonna be a problem. So I said, ‘All right, no problem.’It was reported some time before the Lakers-Knicks game on March 6 that Smith had signed a five-year deal worth at least $100 million with ESPN. The 59-year-old wasn’t planning on taking any risks after that. Smith was pretty upset, though, given so much time had passed since he made the comments that upset LeBron.“It was two months earlier,” Smith said. “I said it in January. This is f***ing April. If you were that upset about it, like I said to Rich Paul, yo, if you had picked up the phone and said to me, ‘LeBron is pissed. Motherf***** want to see you. What would I have done?’ Rich Paul even said, ‘You’d have been on the first plane to L.A.’ No problem. I’d have went to see him.”Smith also defended his comments that started this whole mess. He believes LeBron interpreted them incorrectly.Whatever the case may be, Smith claims he has moved on now. He is no longer upset and even wishes James wins a title with the Philadelphia 76ers.