Shannon Sharpe Says He Won’t Let ‘Six Months Six And A Half Years’ Ruin With Skip Bayless On ‘Undisputed’ As He Prepares To Debut In Stephen A. Smith’s ‘First Take’ This Monday
- Shannon Sharpe joins ‘First Take’ this week in a twice-weekly role
- He opened up to Stephen A. Smith on his ‘Club Shay Shay’ podcast
- DailyMail.com provides all the latest international sports news
Shannon Sharpe is set to make his “First Take” debut on Monday, but the former “Undisputed” co-host has no grudge over his departure from the show.
Sharpe split from Skip Bayless in June after nearly seven years at Fox Sports 1.
And while he acknowledged that there was sometimes tension between the two, he still looks back fondly on his time at Bayless, as he told his new colleague Stephen A. Smith.
“It’s not often that someone can give you that chance. And I’ve said this multiple times, for me I can’t let six months ruin six and a half good years,” Sharpe said on his “Club Shay Shay Podcast with Smith as guest.
“Because sometimes people are willing to throw everything away because of one mistake, one bad comment or something. And even if that was all we had to get.’
Shannon Sharpe had new colleague Stephen A. Smith on his ‘Club Shay Shay’ podcast
Skip Bayless recently ushered in a new era of ‘Undisputed’ with a brand new ‘dream team’
While it’s not clear exactly what Sharpe is talking about, the two clashed last winter over Bayless’ reaction to Damar Hamlin’s collapse on the field.
When the Bills-Bengals game was halted before it was eventually called off, Bayless tweeted, “No doubt the NFL is considering postponing the rest of this game — but how?” Bayless tweeted as medical staff attended to Hamlin at Paycor Stadium.
“This late in the season, a game of this size is crucial to the outcome of the regular season … which suddenly seems so irrelevant.”
Bayless only apologized on air the next day, as co-host Sharpe was noticeably absent.
Sharpe returned the next day, but still disagreed with Bayless’s refusal to delete the tweet.
While Sharpe has since resurfaced on “First Take,” Smith still doesn’t feel good about the way his departure was handled.
“Listen, I have a lot of friends there, okay, we all know that,” Smith said on “Club Shay Shay.” “I know a lot of people, but that doesn’t mean what happened to you is fair. Simply.
That’s not the end of the world, but it is what it is. To me it was just important for us in this industry to stand up and say, he’s one of us, you can’t let him go out like that. And that was it for me. You can go wherever you want, you can come to First Take, fine. You want to go somewhere else, fine.’
Sharpe previously spent nearly seven years with Skip Bayless on Fox Sports’ ‘Undisputed’
Smith previously admitted that he fired former co-host Max Kellerman from ‘First Take’.
Bayless has since replaced Sharpe with a “dream team” made up of ex-NFL stars Richard Sherman, Keyshawn Johnson and Michael Irvin.
But Smith was more than happy to add Sharpe to his show in a biweekly role.
“I wanted the world to know you were wanted,” he said in Club Shay Shay. “In 2009, the industry shut me down and left me for dead. … So let me let the world know that Shannon has me.”
Bayless’ new look ‘Undisputed’ was dominated in the first week in the ratings by ‘First Take’.