Cam Newton backed Steve Smith Sr. after his former colleagues made a joke at the Carolina Panthers legend’s expense on air. Newton addressed the exchange on an episode of his 4th&1 podcast, saying Smith had every right to feel disrespected and that the locker-room version of Smith would have handled it very differently.
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“Journalists should be able to critique athletes,” Newton said on 4th&1. “But journalists or people who cover sports should not make a point by discrediting another person’s career.
“If we just had people covering sports that just played the sport, it would be only one-sided. If we had only people who didn’t play sports covering sports, it would only be one-sided. We need a perfect match because it gives valuable perspectives from both sides.”
It started after Smith followed SportsCenter hosts Gary Striewski and Randy Scott on social media. Scott put words in Striewski’s mouth, saying that one can be a “Hall of Fame player” and still never make the playoffs, presumably using Smith as the example. He missed the postseason in 11 of his 16 seasons. Striewski, right from the beginning, denied having said those words.
When Smith Sr. appeared as a guest on the show, the two continued to banter, with Scott still trying to put his colleague up for sacrifice. But the veteran wide receiver, for a few seconds, simply closed his eyes for a few seconds as they continued their back-and-forth.
Smith spent 16 seasons in the NFL, most of them with the Panthers, and made five Pro Bowls. In 2005, he led the league in receiving yards and finished his career in 2016 with 1,031 catches for 14,731 yards. Unfortunately, he could make the playoffs only five times in his career.
In response to the joke, Smith put the two in order. He first told them to fix their ties, asserting his superiority. But the duo might have become nervous, as both hosts fumbled while speaking to Smith. He also laughed when Striewski seemed to drone on about a question regarding the Bills-Vikings game.
As Newton watched the clip, he knew the situation could have gone differently. Having played with him for three seasons, he knew better than to mess with Steve Smith Sr.
“They about to fool around to find out,” Newton said. “See, this is corporate Steve. I seen locker room, Steve. It would have went completely different had this been in the locker room.
Smith’s “locker room Steve” side was real. Over his career, he was involved in several heated incidents. He punched teammate Anthony Bright in 2002 and teammate Ken Lucas in 2008, and both times it cost him with team suspensions and heavy fines. He was also known for intense altercations on the field, and he had an outburst during practice in 2016.
Newton’s relationship with Smith might have had its lows, too. In February 2025, Newton described the 2011 Panthers team as a “locker room of losers.”
“You could potentially be the first pick, but, bro, you have no way of impacting the game the way a quarterback does. You can lock down the No. 1 receiver. You can make impact plays on offense all you want, but it’s still not like a quarterback. My issue is that, when I was the first pick, I went into a locker room of losers. Just honest.”
Smith took that personally and fired back on X with an angry face emoji.
“53 man locker room – 1 = 52 losers. Wow… breaking news to 89,”
Newton later said he was not aiming those words at Smith in particular, and the two have since moved past it. This time Newton is clearly on Smith’s side. He also hinted that the story is not over, and he expects Smith to keep a receipt.