ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith Sparks Awkward Moment With Longtime Co-Host

A simple question got the ESPN analyst into some trouble.

ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith and Molly Qerim have been working on First Take together for seven years, but apparently that’s not long enough for Smith to know how to pronounce Qerim’s name.

On Friday, the First Take host put Smith on the spot by asking him to pronounce her last name. Smith used a long “e” in his pronunciation, when Qerim is actually pronounced with an “a” sound.

“It’s OK, we’ve only worked together for like seven years; it’s fine,” Qerim said.

Still, Smith didn’t realize he was pronouncing her name incorrectly, as he apparently couldn’t initially tell the difference between the two variations once Qerim told him it was incorrect. And through it all, analyst Marcus Spears was losing it laughing on the right side of the screen as Smith squirmed in awkwardness.

Molly Qerim put Stephen A on the spot to pronounce her last name correctly.

Quite frankly, it did not go well. pic.twitter.com/InSEHJYCSQ

— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) September 16, 2022

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