Stephen A. Smith used his SiriusXM show to stir up an old sports argument this week, saying golfers and NASCAR drivers are not athletes while discussing where LeBron James ranks among the greatest athletes ever for longevity. The debate widened when a listener on Mad Dog Sports Radio suggested Richard Petty as a nominee.
Smith pushed back immediately. “Come on, man. That don’t count. You driving a car!” he said, adding, “I’m being honest, it’s a great sport. But come on, bro. Getting behind the wheel of a car is not the same.” He then repeated his view throughout the two-hour show, saying, “A golfer is not an athlete, A NASCAR driver is not an athlete.”
The exchange came while Smith was trying to frame James’ staying power against other names in sports history, including Petty, whose presence in the conversation pulled NASCAR into the mix. Smith said, “Just because you gotta walk the course for 18 holes for four days, that don’t make you an athlete,” and added, “You’re skilled, you’re phenomenally skilled as a golfer…but that is not an athletic sport.” He also said, “NASCAR is a sport, are they athletes to because they can get behind the wheel of a car and drive 100 plus miles per hour around the track 500 times, you trying to tell me they’re athletes too?”
That is where the friction sits. Smith did not go as far as saying Tiger Woods is not an athlete, and he acknowledged that some golfers can be athletes, though he said it would not be because of their golf abilities. But he repeatedly dismissed the strength, mental focus and physical stamina that golf and stock-car racing demand, leaving his own standard for athletic greatness looking narrower than the sports world he was judging.
For now, the more interesting question is not whether Smith doubled down. He did. It is whether a conversation about LeBron James’ longevity will keep dragging in golfers and drivers, and whether those athletes in their 60s and 70s, especially names like Ryan Preece in the NASCAR lane, remain part of the argument he started.
