By Sam Jemielity

ESPN sports analyst Stephen A. Smith has received death threats. He's been harshly criticized by some of his peers in the sportswriting industry. He's made enemies among athletes he covers -- for starters, NBA stars Stephen Jackson, Glenn Robinson and Jermaine O'Neal don't have him on their Christmas card list.

So what did ESPN do? They gave Smith his own talk show. Last August, ESPN2 launched Quite Frankly with Stephen A. Smith, a daily sports interview show. Defending the outspoken ESPN commentator in Sports Illustrated at the time, then-ESPN VP Mark Shapiro acknowledged the animosity toward his on-air star. "Is he more liked or disliked? Who knows? Who cares? He leaves an imprint," Shapiro told the reporter. "People might come back because they hate him. The bottom line is, they come back." In that same article, the SI writer stated flatly: "[Stephen A. Smith] is the most despised sports personality on the air today."

He's not just hated by sports fans. In the online magazine Slate in early 2005, then ESPN the Magazine contributor Stephen Rodrick argued that television -- and in particular, ESPN -- is ruining sports columns. Rodrick used Smith -- who for years has written a sports column for the Philadelphia Inquirer -- as prosecution Exhibit A. He wrote, "For the Stephen A. Smiths of the world, sports television turns their columns into shrill, non-reported versions of their televised rants."

The enmity goes beyond critical colleagues. Smith told Sports Illustrated last August that he's been the subject of death threats, and that he was considering buying a gun for protection. At the USC-UCLA game this fall, Smith hired bodyguards to escort him while he interacted with fans before the game.

It's hard to imagine another sportswriter who needs bodyguards.

Growing up in Run DMC's hood of Hollis, Queens, Stephen A. Smith played basketball at Winston-Salem College. After getting started at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, he's been on the staff of the Philadelphia Inquirer for more than a decade. He's the first black man to have his own eponymous talk show on the biggest sports network in the world. When he isn't busy producing his ESPN2 show, he writes two columns a week for the Philadelphia Inquirer, hosts an ESPN Radio show, contributes to ESPN's NBA Shootaround and ESPN2's NBA Nation. He made Black Enterprise magazine's Hot List for 2005, a who's who of under-40 success stories from across the spectrum of professions, alongside Halle Berry, Jay-Z, poker pro Phil Ivey and Kanye West. He told SI he makes "something like" NBA-minimum money now (the league minimum is $800,000).

Despite the haters, Smith's show Quite Frankly -- which airs at 11 p.m. ET Monday-Friday on ESPN2 -- is actually one of the better hours of sports television. On a recent episode, Smith repeatedly challenged fired St. Louis Rams coach Mike Martz to explain why he didn't have a new job, speculating that it might be because of Martz's alleged rep for being "paranoid" or "crazy." On another episode, he asked San Diego Chargers linebacker Shawne Merriman whether Merriman's coach, Marty Schottenheimer, was "stupid" for playing Drew Brees in the meaningless season finale (Brees seriously injured his shoulder). These are questions that fans want answered: Fans think Martz is crazy, fans think Schottenheimer made a dumb call. But how many sports reporters out there would ask an NFL player, to his face, if his current coach was "stupid"? Maybe just one: Stephen A. Smith.

Playboy.com wanted to turn the tables and ask Smith a few pointed questions, so we sought him out -- by phone, to avoid any firearm accidents. Stephen A., the ball's in your court.