Mick Unplugged - Who’s In Your Circle? Steve Smith on Mentorship

Episode Date: December 31, 2025

Steve Smith is a legendary former NFL wide receiver, celebrated for his tenacity, intelligence, and relentless drive both on and off the field. From humble beginnings as a “poor black kid who was unsubsidized,” Steve carved out an extraordinary football career with a no-“plan B” mindset, earning admiration as a future Hall of Famer and an inspirational community leader. Post-retirement, Steve has channeled that same passion into business, media, and philanthropy—especially his work in mental health with Behavioral Health Urgent Care (BHUCK). Known for his authenticity, leadership, and fiercely competitive spirit, Steve continues to impact lives by leading with purpose, candor, and heart. Takeaways: Relentless Focus on Plan A: Steve Smith’s story is rooted in his “no plan B” determination—putting everything into football to change the trajectory for his family, and later carrying that same intensity and commitment into business and philanthropy. Mentorship and Learning: Steve highlights how mentorship allowed him to take the “elevator,” learning from the successes and failures of others to accelerate growth and avoid common setbacks. Emotional Intelligence and Growth: Steve openly discusses improving his emotional intelligence, especially in learning to pause before reacting, reflect on his feelings, and balance his directness with empathy—crucial lessons for both life and leadership. Sound Bytes: “If I couldn’t catch a football, I wouldn’t have got my foot in the door. But understanding my intelligence and my willingness to learn keeps me in the door.” –Steve Smith “Just because they are receiving assistance doesn’t mean you lessen their respect of who they are as a human being.” –Steve Smith “How I can critique but not criticize... and give guys the benefit of the doubt. However, if the film tells enough of the story, I can’t give you what you didn’t earn.” –Steve Smith Connect & Discover Steve: Instagram: @stevesmithsr89 YouTube: @89show YouTube: @ironedoutw89 🔥 Ready to Unleash Your Inner Game-Changer? 🔥  Mick Hunt’s BEST SELLING book, How to Be a Good Leader When You’ve Never Had One: The Blueprint for Modern Leadership, is here to light a fire under your ambition and arm you with the real-talk strategies that only Mick delivers.  👉 Grab your copy now and level up your life → Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books A Million    FOLLOW MICK ON: Spotify: MickUnplugged Instagram: @mickunplugged  Facebook: @mickunplugged YouTube:  @MickUnpluggedPodcast  LinkedIn: @mickhunt  Website:  MickHuntOfficial.com Apple: MickUnplugged Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ladies and gentlemen, this is an amazing episode with Steve Smith, Sr. We actually talk more about business and we talk about life. Steve Smith was somebody that he said, if he could reinvent himself or play the game today, he would play it like Steve Smith. I'm just so proud and honor of the man that Steve Smith is in this episode, you're going to hear some really cool stories, and you're going to hear Steve Smith talk about emotional intelligence and break it down. Ladies and gentlemen, I present the goat, Steve Smith Sr.

You're listening to Mick Unplugged, hosted by the one and only Mick Hunt. This is where purpose meets power and stories spark transformation. Mick takes you beyond the motivation and into meaning, helping you discover your because and becoming unstoppable. I'm Rudy Rush, and trust me, you're in the right place. Let's get unplugged. Steve Smith. How you doing?

Good morning. Good afternoon. I appreciate you, man. And like, you have no idea what you mean to me because there's something about you that is also in me. And you've said this, being an older sibling, being the person that people looked up to, I didn't have a plan B, bro. Like, if I was going to change the life of my mom and my sister and my brother, there wasn't representation in my household. There wasn't representation in those four walls that were going to show me how to change. I have a plan B.

And I know that that's something that you've always said, too, man. Like, football was it? Football was it. And, you know, for some people that's watching this and some people who put athletes in a category, the opportunity to get a scholarship, an athletic scholarship, I believe is no different than getting a scholarship for academics. Right? Because I'm very aware there's a lot of sports, non-football, who their whole structure is built off of having a athletic but also intelligent athlete so they can utilize and have a lot of flexibility.

So like soccer, golf, some of the women's sports, that stuff is happening where they get guys who financially can afford to go to college but they also have great grades and and so man and so where I'm going with that is

my no plan B was playing football my whole eggs were in the football basket however what I've been able to experience and learn and be able to be mentored and talk

from people in business wise man yes if I couldn't catch a football I wouldn't have got my foot in the door but understanding my intelligence and my and my willingness to learn keeps me in the door and so yes I am a football player

yes I went to school and what's crazy is I did I did not do the typical psychology at the time I actually did family consumer studies and they they had this crazy myth

that one day people would be willing to they would forfeit a gallon of gas to go get a gallon of milk and I was so they were teaching us about how the consumer consumes yeah

dude that's that's why you are who you are, man. Like, I tell people all the time just about the fire that you have, the energy that you've played with. But more importantly, what you were just talking about, right? Like, you're going to be the best no matter what it is. And to me, that's your plan A, is to dominate no matter what it is that you do, to give your all. And to learn the little details that most people don't have the patience to go do, to be different, to make a name for yourself, to make a brand for yourself. And, bro, like, it shows in everything that you do. So

kudos to you for that, bro. I appreciate that. You talked about something that I think is critically important, right? The power of mentorship. My mentors are celebrity chef Robert Irvine and Damon. Well, like flex. We'll continue. No flex. No flex. But they told me, right? Like sometimes we talk about taking the stairs and it's cool to take the stairs. But when the elevator is there, the smart person takes the elevator, right? Because nobody cares about all that you went through to get there sometimes. Like you still need to know the journey. But when the elevator is present, take the freaking elevator sometime.

And that's what mentorship is done for me. It's like, hey, I don't want you to make this mistake because I've already made it. Let me tell you what the journey is like. But press the elevator to the top floor so you can just go there. Like, to me, that's what mentorship in getting in front of these rooms are. It's like, you still need your journey, but every lesson you don't have to learn when somebody else can tell you what they've learned. Yes, yes.

So I'll tell you a quick story is, man, just by my building and business, so I started doing rental properties. I started right after I retired like 06. And so I'm doing these rental properties. and how I got started was I went to look at this, this property, and man, the property was so dilapidated. It was, it was ridiculous. But it was a duplex. I grew up in a duplex, so I'm very aware of that.

And so I'm looking through, and, man, we do an inspection to go look at the property. And Section 8, because I was on Section 8 as a kid, so trying to stay in that realm. I try to do a lot of programs with my foundation or just a business-wise. My niche is I'm a poor black kid who was unsubsidized. You know, now they call it snack, but, right, latchkey kid. And, man, so a lot of the things I do are about the things that I experienced or did not have at my disposal. So I go on there in the Section 8 house and she has the oven open on and the tub still has water in it because of it not draining properly, not having any heat. So she was using the oven to heat to heat the one bedroom.

And bro, it broke me. it broke me that this landlord had reduced all these people to live in those conditions where they deserve more just because they are receiving assistance doesn't mean you lessen their respect of who they are as a human being and man so from there I was so pissed off and angry man I had a buddy of Mike Salern

He came to my house. We sat in the basement and I kind of talked to him, right, about these things and laid it out to him. Like, this is what I want to do. Man, out of my group of people, even my mentor, he was like, nah, I don't like it. You're at the end of your career. You shouldn't do this. You shouldn't do that. Bro.

Then another person said the same thing. But this guy knew Mike Salamon, he was a home builder. he was like man you know your numbers if your numbers are lying do it man i did it and ended up having some good stuff happening having some bad stuff happened but i rode the roller coaster and then went into covid and that's when it showed me right and so in business i have three phases the first five years that's risky right at then two years later which is the seventh year it starts to kind of shape out

in year 10 though it's either the real deal or it's not yeah and man I learned that bro and it's uh it's been awesome it's been awesome man so everybody that's watching I mean, I've been a huge fantasy smith forever.

So, like, I knew some of these things. You know that business mind that he had, did you? Like, that's what I'm talking about, man. Like, when I say you go all in and everything that you do, that's it, man. Like, when did that become a part of who you were? Or is that just always been part of that, no plan B? It's all, I've always been that way, but here's the, here's the caveat. But I only do a few things.

and I only do those things. Same. So, so I, it may seem like I'm doing 100. I may be doing really 50 or 75 things, but they're all intertwined and they're all on the same page. So I'm not doing, you know, I'm doing golf. I do football, but my golf is in between. Then I do my football, which is every week.

So I got days that, I have those days that's slotted for study, and getting ready, prepare, and then recording. And then some of the other things I'm asked to do, I really weigh now. What is it going to cost me time-wise? Here's the real truth about AI. AI didn't change my businesses because it's cool. It changed my businesses because it removed friction.

My teams move fast. Podcast production, media, deals, leadership development. We have systems everywhere, and for a long time, speed make chaos. Then we leaned into Zapier. Zapier is how we stopped talking about AI and started deploying it. We use Zapier to connect the tools that we already use every single day. Leads get enriched automatically. Workflows trigger without reminders. Systems talk without meetings. And here's what matters. You don't need to be technical. You don't need IT. You don't need complexity. Zapier is built for real teams doing real work who want real results.

No hype, no buzzwords, just time back and momentum forward. Join the 3.4 million companies already automating with Zapier and transform how you work with Zapier and AI. Get started for free by visiting Zapier.com slash Mick. That's Z-A-P-I-E-R dot com slash M-C-K. What am I going to lose out on doing? And so I just, I've learned how to say no. And that's been tough. That's been really tough because when you say no to people and you have a little bit like me,

a bad reputation of a lot of times saying no, when you genuinely are saying no because you really just don't have the bandwidth or you don't have the energy, man, people don't, people don't always take it for what it is. I used to be like that. And then somebody told me a long time ago, Mick, just remember, no is a complete sentence. You don't have to justify it. You don't have to feel bad about it. No is a complete.

And once I adopted that, I just started to understand because then I realized, like, some people just want you to say yes or at least hear them out so that it begins to tug on your heart. And I've just been really quick to just say, hey, I don't have it in me right now. Like, no. Yes, sir, I feel you. So, you know, you talked about the one or two things. And again, there's so many things that I appreciate about you. And I think your journey post-career, I've gotten to see it a little bit on how you keep things simple. I remember it was one of your first analyst roles, like one of the first days.

And you were on set and people were going back and forth. and you were like, hey, guys, you can say all that, but the truth is, this guy is just better than the other guy and he knows it. Like, it ain't about technique. Like, this guy's just a better player. Like, you can be cute, but he's just better. And sometimes it is.

You know, sometimes we get caught up in our head trying to overanalyze because there's so many great analysts out there. There's also so many comments about people how they should or shouldn't do what they don't like about them. You know, the people that like you, They generally don't comment. They heart, they thumbs up, they watch and continue to move on, press on through their day. The haters, the people who have something to say, they're going to make sure they take the time to leave a comment.

But what's crazy, we're in the world right now where people desire to leave a comment about your line of work and put you down. But if you were to do that to them, it gets so offended. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. So, see, this is personal for me. I need coaching and mentoring from Steve Smith right now. Oh, well, you're the kettle calling the pop black. Okay.

No, I need it. So, again, we have so much in common. You've got that, I guess we call it the dog, right? Like, you've got that, that fire inside. I know that there were times that your team didn't share that same fire that you had. How do you, and this is for the viewers and listeners, the business leaders that are watching, how do you take your competitive fire, that streak that you have? And I don't know, like, when you see that your teammate doesn't have it and you want to be disappointed,

but you also understand, like, maybe that's just not. not them. And so you start to act a different way. Like, how do you handle that? This is you coaching me right now. Well, one, every situation is different. And here's the thing that I do believe. When you're a tough credit on your teammates, that can wear them down.

So I would say a lot of my teammates who love me, also when they play with me, were annoyed by me, were irritated because of doing that. And it wears on people, right? Where they say, you know, you get more, you get more bees with honey, right? But, man, ultimately, you know, the best way you can do it is start to really analyze yourself and say, okay, you know, why am I reacting in that way? And then it goes to a deeper question, what am I really feeling? What's really going on? right what are and because you could be triggered or somebody can do something

unintentionally that reminds you of another situation and you don't even know it and then they they cross hairs and the only thing that you know is rage uh disappointment anger all that stuff so for me man is i've i've really started to take the approach um i'm a wait sometimes I will wait a long time. There's other times where if I receive an email that I don't really, I'm not liking the vibe of the email. So I already know I can't respond immediately. I got to let a couple of days go by and think about a few times.

If I'm thinking about it like a couple hours later, I'm still like irritated. Like I could be irritated. But that wasn't there. attention. They didn't wake up and say, hey, I want to irritate you. However, what was in there that made me feel that way, that's what I got to focus on. And once I, you know, kind of go through that long process and do that, man, I really started to be able to say yes and no and no, no my own temperature. I know you didn't do this purposely, but you just broke down the pillars of emotional

intelligence, man. And, like, that's what I speak about. Like, that's what I get hired to call. Hey, hey, don't tell, don't tell people I'm intelligent. No, shh. Hey, but you are in the emotional intelligence, man, self-awareness, knowing who you are, the self-regulation, right? The taking the minute to pause or the day to pause, the motivation behind it, the social skills of communication, and the one I struggle with the most is empathy. Like, I am probably the least empathetic person in the world. And it sucks because you want to feel it. Right.

But you also like, well, got to get my hustle on. Got to move on. You know? Yeah. That literally is me, man. It's like I work on that more than anything else. It's just being empathetic, showing empathy. Because when you have that grind, when you have that dog, when you don't have a plan

be like sometimes empathy feels like excuses right like i feel like people are giving me excuses and i know they're not but and that's why i have to work on it every day because it's like if i know this is the end result that we need to get to let's just get there like yeah i want to pause and listen to you but that that train ain't stopping right like we still got to go so yeah and like now i want to go to your your career and again you played the position that my uncle played, so I feel like I know wide receiver, even though I didn't play, bro, like, the things that you did, that you, that another person, your size, that had to go through the same journey that you had, would not have been able to do it.

Like, that's just me being honest, because there isn't another Steve Smith, like, people can say what they want to. They can get mad at me or they can go look at the facts. The facts show, the data shows, there hasn't been another Steve Smith. do you look at it that way too I would say there's not there's not another Steve Smith because we all want our own names

right right not that I am so unique right to the world now I'm unique right in overall because there's no one else like me right right

however there's also no one else like you either so this isn't about who's better but so what I realize is just kind of you just be who you are man yeah you just be who you are and that's going to be some good and you know dang sure it's going to be some bad too yeah and so you guys surround you guys surround yourself around people who uh really can walk things through with you

and you can trust them. Yeah. And they can trust you. That's the key. That's the key. That is totally the key. You know, I, we watch the game of football today and it

doesn't seem like you retired long ago, but it seems like the game has changed so much since you've retired, right? Like the things that that you did on the field just from, these are the words of Mick and McOnly, from totally punishing your opponent in a good way, right?

Like, people get suspended for that now, right? Or they get looked at it. But it's like, hey, sometimes Steve Smith just knows he's better than the person on the other side. And he doesn't need that opponent to think that he's got a chance to hang with this. Right. Right. Well, that goes, here's the other part

I got sidetracked on. You know, we go on the Hall of Fame and you go on the Hall of Fame or they have your individual numbers and your name on the back of your jersey because they want to identify who you are. And so if they are already saying that we need to identify each player in each position,

then yes, there also will never be another Randy Moss. There are people who maybe look like him from the eye test. But there are things. about Randy Mauls, that when God created Randy, that's, it was only unique to him. Yeah. Yeah. You know, so, so for me, if there's another me, if there was another me or if there were other players like me, then I no longer would be needed.

I would have lost my job. Because they can just, they can just go out when I do something stupid. They can just go out in a corner, just grab another one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, one of the things that I thought made, you talk about a Randy Moss. I would say you, Randy Moss, Chris Carter, had this unique skill set.

And this is why my uncle said, if he could reinvent himself, he would be Steve Smith. Forget the feciness. Forget that dog that you had. You had such a cany ability to not give tails when the ball was arriving. Like, you would almost prepare to catch it at literally the last. last moment so the DB didn't know the ball because you know playing the position right like DBs know when the ball is coming because the eyes raised and you started to put your hands out like you had this ability like last moment bam I show like talk us about that bro because that's

the skill that most people don't have yeah just studying study my opponents a lot of opponents would look at your eyes or try to hit your arm I remember studying Nate Clemens oh he was with San Francisco after he had left Buffalo. And I just remember studying him and watching him. And it was one of those things with him. He knew when a ball was coming. And so he rarely turned around. And he would just hit his hands.

So that forced me at that time to learn a new technique because if I didn't, I didn't eat that week. Yes, I heard. So it was, it was just, it was things that I picked up that I started to do. Right. And so in football, man, you see players they have up and down. seasons because every year it's a new habit for you to break every single year right there are going to be things that you do well and there are going to be things that you want to cover your eyes just because you create a new habit that you weren't even aware of because there's

scouting reports and players who watch all your film to see what bad habits you have yes sir also to see what good habits you have yeah and again that's why I love how you break things down simple. And I think you, I know, you know, people look at you as an analyst and they may say, oh, well, Steve's hard on, on these players, but like, you're trying to give advice. You're actually trying to mentor them through the platforms that you have. Actually, I'm not. That's the crazy part. No, I'm not. Like, I'm not trying to mentor anybody through my podcast and through my crafts. I believe mentorship is, you know, reaching out to each other and conversating. man sometimes i i have been harsh and and so now for me is i'm trying to have that balance too

because i am a pessimistic paul right a very not much optimistic oscar and so trying to find that balance and so what i catch myself doing is a lot of times when i do my nose and i'm saying why is this player not going to perform well devil's advocate what why did he perform well And so I'm trying to see those balance. And the new, you know, the, the new age guys, they prefer, you know, they prefer the compliments laid on more than the criticism. And so just trying to find different words and different ways that I'm comfortable with, how I can critique but not criticize. Okay. Right.

And, and give guys to be. benefit of the doubt. However, if the film tells enough of the story, I can't give you what you didn't earn. Right. Steve Smith, Sr. is always going to tell the truth. If anything else, you're always going to tell the truth, bro. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. So you also have something that's dear to my heart. Like, you are always active in the community. You're always trying to, I don't want to say leave things better than you found them, but find ways to make impact. And I think you, in community, you do that really well. And I want to talk and give you the floor to talk about B-Huck for a minute because I'm a huge fan of what you're doing there

and the mission behind it. Well, the B-Huck is acronym for behavioral health urgent care. And this urgent care is basically we do assessments. And then assessments, you're held for 23 hours. It's all volunteer. But also we have some places where most of the time people with mental health go to the emergency room. And so if you go to an emergency room and you are arrested or accompanied by a police officer, now that police officer must sit in the same... emergency room with that patient for however long it takes.

And sometimes it could take up to 13 hours. So now these police officers, who were probably all five hours ago, he's still, or she is still, she's still at the hospital waiting for a clinician because at the emergency room, emergency room for mental health and emergency room for medical help, there's a difference. Yeah. Right? There's a difference. And so by having our B-huck, now police officers can drop this person off and they can go home.

And then once they're assessed and there's a plan in action or the next steps, then they call the police and then they go back. And so even if they did a crime, they get the opportunity to be evaluated if it's mental health versus just going to jail, right? Having a plan assessment. We do kids from ages four all the way to 80-year-old. And the best part about it, because a lot of the things I do is things I experience with no insurance. So if you don't have insurance, don't matter. Come on in. If you do have insurance, we'll take that too, right?

Right. And so working with Medicaid, working with some of the people in the city and the county, man, I've learned a lot. it. I've learned a ton and it's been awesome. And from based off that, we've created hygiene kits, right? And so given some of these folks hygiene kits, be able, you know, they're on the street, some of those things that they have going on, the basic necessities they don't have. So it's been, I've learned a lot in the mental health and it all stemmed. We have a medical clinic as well. But it was the first time the medical clinic, In COVID, we had received in the first eight months, 1,600 hours of clinical work. And we had 6,000 medical patients, but everybody wanted to come in for counseling. And then that's when we knew that it needed to be a standalone. Yeah. Yeah.

Dude, that is so impactful, bad. And again, kudos to you for addressing a need and doing something about it. Because a lot of times, you know, when you and I were growing up in our community, it wasn't a thing. And even if it was a thing, you didn't want to talk about it. You didn't want to go there and do it, right? So I thank you more than you know about bringing that to awareness. I'm a huge mental health advocate. I do a lot in the mental health space as well, too.

But a lot of that stem from people like you saying, it's okay to talk about it. And then that led me to understand that, like, wait a second. Like, I didn't talk about the things that were going through my head, which was great. Like, if people would have knew the 10 to 20-year-old me, they would have literally thought I was crazy, some of the things that was going in my head. But, like, I didn't have that outlet. And I just felt like the only way to get out was to get out. And so that's what I did.

And so, again, I applaud you for that, bro. I applaud you for that. And I usually start the show with this, but I'm going to end it with this. I like asking my guest, what's there because? that purpose, that mission that you have, right? Like, Simon Sinek said start with why, right? And you ask people what their why is and they'll tell you whatever. I like going a little bit deeper.

Like, what's your because? Like, if I were to say what's your why and then say, but why, you usually say, well, because A, B, and C, I care about what happens after because. Because at the age and stages that I'm at right now, I'm just learning some new elements and some new layers about me that, I've never really approached before. I'm really going in with such, I just got LASIC, so it's a great analogy, I'm going in with such a new vision.

Like it. Right, the blurriness, like, is starting to kind of, it's been two weeks now, the blurliness is starting to, starting to come, come away. And I'm starting, oh, oh, that's what it looks like, you know, that's what it looks like clear, huh? Yeah. So. To wake up and not have to put glasses or contacts on,

it must feel great, bro. I've been in glasses or contacts since I was like 20. Do all this the first time, so I'm not really sure. There you go. Well, Steve, man, I appreciate your time. I know how busy you are. You mean the world to me, brother. Keep impacting.

Keep doing the amazing things that you do and just know that you always got somebody in your corner, bro. Appreciate it. Thank you so much. You got it. And to all the viewers and listeners, remember your because is your superpower. Go unleash it. That's another powerful conversation on Mick Unplugged. If this episode moved you, and I'm sure it did, follow the show wherever you listen, share it with someone who needs that spark, and leave a review so more people can find there because. I'm Rudy Rush, and until next time, stay driven, stay focused, and stay unplugged.

Thank you.