When Fox Sports began negotiating a buyout of Skip Bayless’ $8 million per year FS1 contract in 2024, ESPN killed the reunion talk with Stephen A. Smith before it even started. An ESPN spokesman noted that they were sorted with the First Take cast, and “wish Skip the best in his future endeavors.” Renowned NFL analyst and the face of First Take, Stephen A. Smith, confirmed it himself.

“Skip Bayless and Stephen A. Smith, together as partners, working across from each other on a debate show, is over. It’s been over,” Smith had said. “This is not the first time I’ve said it. There’s no negativity or shade being shown at Skip Bayless. I have moved on.”

But less than two years later, ESPN has reversed course. Front Office Sports’ Michael McCarthy reports that Bayless is scheduled to appear on First Take this Friday, May 8, alongside Smith. ESPN confirmed the appearance, describing it as a “one-time show” – not a full return.

It will be the first time Bayless and Smith have appeared together on First Take since June 2016 – the month Bayless left ESPN to co-host Undisputed alongside NFL legend Shannon Sharpe at FS1.

This reunion notably started with a podcast. In March 2025, Smith taped an episode of The Skip Bayless Show – their first time on air together since 2016. By November, the two were photographed together at Nate ‘N Al’s deli in Beverly Hills, seated in a booth with Bayless’ wife, Ernestine. The image caught enough people off guard that the person who shared it actually felt the need to clarify that it wasn’t AI-generated.

Then came Super Bowl LX Radio Row in February 2026, where Smith and Bayless shared a camera on The Arena: Gridiron – their first in-person, on-air appearance since the split. At the time, Bayless had noted how he and Smith had impacted the media landscape. 

“I still hear people say that you and I ruined sports media,” Bayless had told Smith on the show. “That we destroyed it with our style or whatever it is. That it’s ‘‘Screamin’ A. Smith and Skip Bayless.’ That’s all we ever heard. And if I may say so myself, I think we revolutionized it. And the ratings would say we were pretty good. And I would say that no one has ever quite matched the chemistry that maybe God about gave us. It’s hard to find, you can’t teach it, coach it. It just worked.”

Stephen A. Smith had agreed at the time, taking a shot at the critics instead.

“You’re right,” Smith said. “And I think it’s a lot of BS when it comes to that stuff because you got a lot of jealousy, a lot of envy, because people look at what we’ve been able to achieve and they’re like, why them? Why not us?”

Skip Bayless and ESPN have been circling each other for years – and the road back is longer and more complicated than a single confirmed guest slot suggests.

The history behind the reunion

After Bayless left ESPN in 2016 to join FS1’s Undisputed with Shannon Sharpe, he came close to going back when his original FS1 contract expired in 2021. ESPN had notably made him an offer to return to First Take – a deal that probably would have pushed out Max Kellerman, who was eventually removed from the show that year. Fox Sports exercised its matching clause and kept Bayless at FS1. At the time, Bayless had noted that he chose to stay loyal to Fox, but Stephen A. Smith wasn’t happy about it.

“I was devastated. Stephen A. Smith was devastated,” Bayless revealed to the Washington Post. “They were obviously not really happy that I would be so disloyal as to try to strong-arm my way out of FS1.”

Despite continuing to deliver a hit show for three more years, Bayless’ time at FS1 did not end on the best note either. The company negotiated a buyout of his $8 million per year contract in 2024, and the Undisputed was eventually cancelled. His co-host, Sharpe, had already joined ESPN, and the company had already confirmed that he would not be joining the network. However, just two years later, things have panned out differently.

ESPN is calling May 8 a “one-time show.” But the network that flatly refused to have Skip Bayless back is now the one hosting his return. And Smith, who once declared their TV Partnership “over” on his own show, will now be sitting across from him once again. Whatever ESPN says about a single appearance, the positioning has clearly shifted. The question is, will this be enough to create a permanent reunion?