Michelle Beadle and Cody Decker were fired by Sirius XM, just a day after Beadle openly criticized her long-time rival, Stephen A. Smith, for taking her position this September.
Sirius XM and the Beadle & Decker co-hosts have ‘parted ways’ as of Thursday night, as per Front Office Sports.
Beadle addressed the situation on X, confirming the reports and expressing her gratitude by saying: ‘And we’d like to thank the callers who made the last couple of days an absolute blast!! Truly. You don’t usually get such love on your way out.’
‘Security usually walks ya to the door. You guys rule. 6 hours of how you felt. And you all were heard!’
Decker, meanwhile, said in a series of tweets: ‘Our listeners. My god. Just badasses. Unruly passionate badasses. So who’s drinking?’
Upon hearing about the Smith arrangement on Wednesday, Beadle did not hide her frustration over losing her role to the ESPN figure, with whom she has a contentious history.
Michelle Beadle has left Sirius XM a day after her rant about Stephen A. Smith taking her job
The two have history, with Beadle calling Smith out for remarks about Ray Rice in 2014
‘Yeah so the cat’s out of the bag, I guess we’re talking about it,’ Beadle told her audience. ‘We weren’t supposed to, just as a heads up.’
Although they knew they were on their way out, Beadle and co-host Decker didn’t know they were being replaced by Smith until his interview with Sirius XM’s Howard Stern earlier in the day.
‘We were only given a few hours’ notice, but we weren’t told any details, we were promised that no details would be released,’ she said. ‘We didn’t even know who was taking our place in the lineup, just that it was going to be announced that a new show was being added.
‘Unbeknownst to us, “The Hollywood Reporter,” of course, had all the details,’ Beadle continued, referring to an article about Smith’s interview with Stern. ‘So it was a little embarrassing, I’m not going to lie.
‘I’ve been in this business for 20-plus years, I’ve been treated poorly a couple times, this didn’t feel good, I’m not gonna lie.’
Her feud with Smith goes back to 2014, when she ripped Stephen A. Smith for comments about NFL great Ray Rice’s domestic violence assault, where he suggested women ‘provoke’ being hit.
Beadle wrote on X: ‘So I was just forced to watch this morning’s First Take. A) I’ll never feel clean again B) I’m now aware that I can provoke my own beating.’
Smith was suspended for a week by ESPN and apologized for his remarks.
Beadle has departed alongside her co-host, Cody Decker, as of Thursday evening
Speaking Wednesday, Beadle said of Smith: I don’t respect him. I don’t respect his work. He doesn’t like me. This goes back to the Ray Rice stuff.
‘He made some really piggish comments on the air. I responded; he got suspended for like two weeks. I think that was sort of the beginning of the end for anything.
‘I just don’t respect him. I think he gets things wrong all the time. I’m not talking about opinions; those can never be wrong. But factually, when you spread yourself so thin, it’s hard to be right. Not a fan.’
Beadle seemed to anticipate an early exit from her Sirius job, with Front Office Sports saying that she expects to finalize a buyout.
Smith recently signed a five-year, $120 million extension with ESPN, but told Stern he’d add a pair of SiriusXM shows to his already busy schedule beginning in September. One of those gigs will be replacing Beadle & Decker.
Beadle previously had a couple of stints at ESPN, one of which she thought was cut short because she’d angered LeBron James.
The issue, Beadle told podcaster Renee Paquette in 2022, stemmed from her poking fun at ‘The Decision’ – the televised 2010 special in which James announced he was signing with the Miami Heat.
‘I made fun of The Decision, and I was one of about a bazillion people that did,’ Beadle said in 2022. ‘This was a long time ago, I guess when I followed him, and I got a DM that was, ‘Why are you so mean to me on television?’ And I just sort of laughed it off, I didn’t even think about it.
‘Of course I took it personally, it was personal, he wanted me fired, he tried to do that,’ she said. ‘But then I found out after the fact, when all of this sort of came out, I would get messages or texts or videos from people being like, that kind of s*** was happening to them too. He was super petty and he would try to have some sort of an effect, whether it would be small or whatever, just an effect.’
James has never addressed the allegation.
