During an appearance on First Take, Kai Cenat challenged Stephen A. Smith on his opinion on who the GOAT NBA player is.
Cenat suggested that Leandro Barbosa would be his pick for the greatest NBA player of all-time. Smith didn't appear impressed with the take but chimed in after he offered praise for Kyrie Irving, too. "I love Leandro Barbosa, the brother could play no doubt about it, mad respect to him but the NBA GOAT? I might have banned you from this show if I knew you'd say that on national television," said Smith.
"Ban me?!" replied Cenat. "Stephen A, what's your problem with Leandro Barbosa? 'Cause I ain't gonna lie, Stephen, when it come to LeBron James you start hating. That's how I feel. I feel like you more of an older generation type of dude. You like Michael Jordan, cool, but listen... Every time there's a debate going on with you and Michael Jordan and LeBron James, you always got something to say about LBJ. And I'm here to say, bro, LeBron's better than Jordan. I said it."
Smith, without missing a beat, chimed in and said, "Something wrong with you." He smiled and added, "Don't you even think about coming on this show with that, Kai, don't you do it!"
Cenat highlighted that LeBron James recently became the first NBA player to surpass 50,000 points in his professional career, while Smith countered that Jordan didn't play as long as LeBron has. Smith recently said he thinks it is time to not have the debate anymore.
"LeBron is 40 years old and is performing better than half of the people in the league right now!" said Cenat.
Smith proceeded to refer to Cenat as a "young whippersnapper," and said that he's not going to deny that LeBron is one of the greats of the league. "We give him all the credit in the world, and then some young whippersnapper like yourself will come on the show and go like this, 'You hating, you hating,'" he said. "It's like, wait a minute. Y'all want us to give him a bib and an apron, too? What do you want to do, give him a pacifier? I mean, damn, the man is one of the greatest players ever! What's the problem?"
Cenat challenged Smith and asked if he can hoop, to which he said, "Hell yes." He then said, despite having "two jacked-up knees," he could play better than Cenat, who is 34 years younger than him. "So why don't you play me?" Cenat said. "I gotta handicap myself to some degree, I got to give you some kind of fair chance," Smith joked. "Come on, man, stop that."
Cenat suggested that people were sleeping on his athletic abilities, and was then asked who he would compare himself to. "Kevin Hart," Smith interjected. "You just compared me to that little Leprechaun?!" said Cenat. "Kevin... it's past his time." Smith started to lose his mind after Cenat said he's been compared to several NBA players, including Allen Iverson. "I might beat Kevin and you by myself," Smith laughed.
Watch the whole segment up top.