Stephen A. Smith has announced that he wants to be the new host of Wheel of Fortune and he did it in the most Stephen A. way possible.
Earlier this week, Wheel of Fortune host Pat Sajak revealed that this would be his last season on the game show. His retirement will end his 41-year tenure as the show’s host. While there has been speculation that Sajak’s daughter Maggie could possibly replace him given she filled in for him before during emergency surgery in 2019, it appears that the face of ESPN’s First Take has his own ideas.
Yesterday on his podcast self-titled The Stephen A. Smith Show, Stephen A. declared with authority that he “wanna throw his name into the hat!” Smith discussed his own love for the show as well as his late-mother who he said “really, really” loved it before ultimately going on a classic Stephen A. rant about being the host.
While Stephen A. does wish to take over for Sajak, he doesn’t plan on that affecting any of his current roles. “I ain’t trying to give up my day job,” he said. “I ain’t trying to give up my podcast. But I gotta tell you, if Wheel of Fortune called to ask me to host for a couple of days, I wouldn’t mind.”
Of course, being Stephen A. the self-proclaimed “bottom feeder,” he needed to address which fine women he would have replace Vanna White who is also reportedly leaving the show with Sajak. Smith said he “wouldn’t mind Meagan Good turning those letters [or] Sanaa Lathan turning those letters.” In his quite seductive and serious tone, Smith made a great point that those two fine women would indeed lead to higher ratings. Agreed, Stephen A.
As a massive fan of game shows and even bigger fan of Stephen A. Smith, I desperately hope this comes to fruition. For a show that is purely made for old people, Stephen A. would add a whole new level of excitement. Imagine someone guesses a Z and then for the next five minutes we just hear Stephen A. scream “a Z! You guessed a Z? That is absolute blasphemy!” Tell me that isn’t great television. You already know Stephen A. would input his own opinions into the show and probably solve the puzzle out loud anytime he could.
Do I think this legitimately happens? Hell no. Do I think it would get a bigger audience than the current one made up solely of 55+ year old white women? Yes, yes I do. Wheel of Fortune couldn’t hurt to change it up a bit and I seriously don’t think there is a bigger change out there than going from Sajak to Smith.
