A similar open-mindedness characterized the show’s handling of the George Floyd protests. In 2020, Drew Brees, then the quarterback of the New Orleans Saints, responded to the news of Mr. Floyd’s death by saying that he opposed protesting police brutality if doing so involved “disrespecting the flag” by kneeling during the national anthem. Mr. Sharpe suggested on air that Mr. Brees should retire from football, arguing that anyone so blithely insensitive could not be an effective leader in a locker room in which the majority of players were African American.
Mr. Brees responded by contacting Mr. Sharpe, and the two had a wide-ranging phone conversation about race and American history whose contents Mr. Sharpe later shared on air. This included Mr. Sharpe’s comment to Mr. Brees that given Mr. Brees’s charitable work in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, “no white quarterback in the history of the N.F.L. has had Black support like you got it,” which, in Mr. Sharpe’s view, had made Mr. Brees’s comments especially painful. Mr. Brees later made a public apology and even took a knee during the national anthem with his teammates. (Months later, when Mr. Brees announced his actual retirement, no reference was made on “Undisputed” to his earlier comments, and both hosts showered him with superlatives. It is difficult to imagine such graciousness in other media settings.)
Unlike popular podcasts such as “Pardon My Take,” which is essentially sports comedy, or TV shows such as “The Herd” on FS1, whose host Colin Cowherd aspires to disinterested analysis of sports, “Undisputed” was premised explicitly upon antagonism, in this case between its hosts. Even their ongoing bets, wagering cases of Diet Mountain Dew, and their elaborate visual jokes — Mr. Sharpe bringing a bottle of Hennessy and Black and Mild cigars to celebrate the Eagles beating the Patriots in Super Bowl LII or Mr. Bayless affectionately nuzzling a Cowboys jersey — were attempts at one-upmanship calculated to annoy one another.
This high-spirited raillery was very much a part of the appeal of “Undisputed” (there is a whole genre of YouTube video compilations of Mr. Sharpe’s agonized cries of “Skiiiiiiiiiiiip!”), but during the show’s long run it also led to occasional displays of genuine animosity. On one episode last year, for instance, Mr. Bayless accused his partner of envying Tom Brady’s longevity in the N.F.L. and made light of Mr. Sharpe’s own achievements as a player. Mr. Sharpe, who seemed astonished at the ad hominem nature of the argument, removed his glasses with a look of genuine woundedness. In another episode, a disagreement about the N.F.L.’s decision to postpone the conclusion of a Buffalo Bills game after a player collapsed on the field led to a similar altercation, in which Mr. Sharpe suggested his partner should remove a tweet he considered offensive and Mr. Bayless said that he would not do so because he had not changed his opinion. Such incidents were inevitable. Candor has its price.
When I first read reports earlier this month of Mr. Sharpe’s impending departure from the show, I felt dejected, as if a beloved relation had announced that he was going into exile abroad. While it is hard at present to say what motivated “Unc” (as fans have styled him) to leave, I, for one, hope that it is not resentment of his longtime debate partner, as some commentators have speculated. In the final segment of Tuesday’s episode Mr. Sharpe thanked Mr. Bayless — along with dozens of makeup artists, front desk staff, schedulers and security personnel — with tears in his eyes.