The news of Lane Johnson's mid-season retirement headlined the NFL news cycle on Tuesday, with the longtime Eagles right tackle sharing that "right now my heart is telling me it's time to say goodbye to football."
As he hit on in his retirement post, Johnson has long been vocal about past mental health struggles and how they've impacted his desire to play football. They played a role in his decision to call it a career.
On Wednesday, however, Stephen A. Smith called out Johnson for the timing of his retirement decision, which resulted in backlash toward the ESPN personality before he later apologized.
Here's why Smith wound up apologizing for his take about Johnson and a look at some of the reactions to what he said.
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Stephen A. Smith issues apology over controversial Lane Johnson take
With the Eagles already facing some offensive issues early in 2026, Smith questioned why "one of the all-time greats" would wait until Week 5 to retire.
“After being subjected to this, he said, ‘Life is a little bit too short,'” Smith said. “I need to focus on — what did he say? His mental health? Am I making it up? Did he say that? Four games into the 2026 season, a dude that has been in the league forever, sits back and says, ‘I need to focus on my mental health.’ As an offensive tackle, lord, you know it is bad.”
Smith then clarified that he wasn't trying to "make light of mental health issues."
"I'm making light of the Philadelphia Eagles' trashy situation right now," Smith said. "Usually, NFL players, when they make the decision to come back, they're married to it for that year."
A few hours later, during an appearance on his own show, Smith apologized, also opening up about the grief of losing his mother.
"People misconstrued me minimizing mental health," Smith said. "I'm not only sensitive to mental health issues, I'm very aware of it."
"I wasn't talking about [Lane Johnson] and mental health. I was talking about how the Eagles, and how chaotic their situation is, can drive you to it."
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C.J. Gardner-Johnson, more bash Stephen A. Smith for Lane Johnson take
Considering Johnson's openness about mental health struggles, including missing three games in 2021 from withdrawal symptoms after cycling off SSRI antidepressants, Smith received a lot of criticism for how he framed the offensive lineman's retirement.
Bills safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson, a former teammate of Johnson's, wrote that Smith should "be there for us instead of mock us."
Plenty of fans, media members and more called out Smith for downplaying Johnson's mental health struggles.
