“She ain’t Beyoncé,” Stephen A. Smith throws SHADE at Rihanna on account of her Super Bowl halftime performance
Stephen A. Smith said that Rihanna is many things but she is not Beyoncé
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ESPN analyst Stephen A. Smith comes under heavy fire after he threw shade at one of the pop icons Rihanna. The Barbadian pop singer will be headlining the Super Bowl halftime show this year. Smith’s sneaky jab came after he was asked by Sherri Shepherd whether he was excited about Rihanna’s Super Bowl halftime performance.
Speaking on Sherri Shepherd’s daytime talk show SHERRI on Wednesday, Smith said he is excited about Rihanna’s performance and yet still went on to throw shade at the 9-time Grammy Award winner. “I don’t want to say I’m not excited,” said Smith. “She’s fantastic. That’s not where I’m going with this.”
“Ladies and gentlemen, she’s a lot of things, She’s spectacular, actually. And congratulations on new mamahood.” Smith continued about Rihanna. “There’s one thing she’s not, she ain’t Beyoncé.“
Smith went on to justify his comparison by saying that he only brought up Beyoncé because she recently performed in the Super Bowl. He also said that he’s not throwing shade but simply trying to say that there are levels. “I like television, I like a lotta talent out there. There’s some spectacular females in television, I just wanna say that. Everybody ain’t Sherri. That’s not throwing shade on them! That’s appreciating their greatness but understanding there’s levels.” said Smith about his comparison of Rihanna with Beyoncé.
Stephen A. Smith throws shade at Rihanna while comparing her with Beyoncé
The ESPN analyst went on to slam Rihanna by comparing her with the pop Queen Beyoncé on Sherri Shepherd’s show on Wednesday. “Rihanna’s music is fantastic. She’s great, she’s a sister. I love her dearly, I listen to her music. I’m gonna support her ’til the cows come home! I’m just telling you, for me, there’s Beyoncé, there’s everybody else.”
Surprisingly, Rihanna once said that she wouldn’t perform at the Super Bowl because there are things within the organization that she doesn’t agree with. “I couldn’t dare do that,” Rihanna told Vogue in 2019. “For what? Who gains from that? Not my people. I just couldn’t be a sellout. I couldn’t be an enabler. There’s things within that organization that I do not agree with at all, and I was not about to go and be of service to them in any way.”
Rihanna was reportedly not even the first choice to be the headliner at the Super Bowl halftime show. There were reports that the NFL was looking to rope in Taylor Swift as the headliner but she couldn’t do it due to bad timing as she was working on completing all the re-recordings of her past work.
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Aravind Raj
(2075 Articles Published)