Stephen A. goes back in time

SO ESPN’s shout-itfrom-the-pulpit and lead go-to guy for everything, Stephen A. Smith, again revealed himself as a rotten guesswork artist, this time for previewing Thursday’s ChargersChiefs game based on matchups that weren’t because they couldn’t.

He emphasized that he has paid extra close attention to a couple of players in particular: “I’m thinking about Hunter Henry and the way he has played this year. ... He’s going up against Derrick Johnson.”

Fascinating. Henry, a tight end, has been out all season with an ACL he tore in May. Johnson, a linebacker, was released by the Chiefs in February.

Smith once ripped Chargers coach Marty Schottenheimer for not attempting a late-game field goal on third down, explaining, “if they missed it, they could try again on fourth down.”

So this past Thursday he fabricated a bunch of nonsense and reported it to a national audience as fact. What’s ESPN to do? Well, at ESPN it has long been a matter of not what was done, but who did it.

Doesn’t matter how many games of each he calls, Fox’s Joe Buck still speaks football as baseball. He still speaks average points scored as NFL teams’ offense-only stat when, week after week, he can see it’s not.

Though Buck is not alone — hardly — he’s in a special position. Perhaps he’ll soon refer to runners on third base as in the red zone.

Next Sunday, Dec. 23, the Giants will play the Colts in Indy. Sixty years ago, Dec. 28, 1958, in Yankee Stadium, Baltimore Colts RB Alan Ameche scored in sudden-death OT to beat the Giants in the NFL championship game.

That game, televised here on CBS and nationally seen by 45 million viewers, has since been credited with establishing the NFL as a TV property now worth billions.