Legendary martial artist and actor Chuck Norris passed away at the age of 86 this week. As you might expect, ESPN's Stephen A. Smith was asked to give his thoughts on his passing.
Based on the reaction, it probably would have been best if he didn't.
On Friday's edition of First Take, Smith said that long before UFC and the Gracie family became the icons of mixed martial arts, there were two people who were truly in the public consciousness as far as MMA and entertainment: Chuck Norris and Bruce Lee. Smith asserted that the only truly negative thing to say about Norris was that he wasn't Lee.
"The only think you can say negatively about him, is that he wasn’t Bruce Lee… but Chuck Norris was absolutely, positively special," Smith said.
Missing Context
Unfortunately, that last line was taken a little bit out of context online and many people took it to mean he thought that Lee was better overall than Norris. As a result, there's been a little bit of a backlash towards him this morning.
"Why does anything negative need to be said? Dumbest thing you will hear today…" one user on X wrote.
"This is so distasteful. You don’t have to pretend to be a jerk for tv, you know? His family is mourning, people are sad for him, and you’re up here talking about “he was no Bruce Lee”. Get a grip dude," wrote another.
"What's not being Bruce Lee got to do with anything? Wtf kinda take is that?" a third remarked.
Other fans didn't like Smith's remarks on Norris because they feel it's an endorsement of Norris' polarizing support for President Donald Trump. Many clearly feel that Norris lost their respect due to his decades of support for conservative and Republican politics.
Nevertheless, in the space of mixed martial arts and entertainment, there aren't many people who paved the way for the two areas to collide as much as Norris did. Lee might be above him, but there's a pretty big gap between those behind him.
