James Smith (born September 2, 1977) is an American

sports broadcaster In sports broadcasting, a sports commentator (also known as sports announcer or sportscaster) provides a real-time commentary of a game or event, usually during a live broadcast, traditionally delivered in the historical present tense. Radio w ...

and former mixed martial artist. He was the co-host of the television show '' Fight Quest'', with Doug Anderson, on the

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...

. He is also a former commentator for Bellator,

UFC The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) is an American mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion company based in Las Vegas, Nevada. It is owned and operated by Zuffa, a wholly owned subsidiary of Endeavor Group Holdings. It is the largest MMA ...

Premier Boxing Champions ''Premier Boxing Champions'' (PBC) is an ongoing series of televised boxing events connected to manager Al Haymon. PBC was initially promoted as an effort to return boxing to mainstream broadcast and cable television, as opposed to premium chann ...

and WWE’s Raw brand. He is a former host for ''

American Ninja Warrior American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, p ...

'' in 2010–2011.

Early life

Smith was born on September 2, 1977. He was a former high school wrestler and teacher. He attended

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...

in college but at that time, they did not have a wrestling team so some students who wrestled in high school would meet at the Wooden Center to wrestle. He was introduced to

Brazilian jiu-jitsu Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ; pt, jiu-jitsu brasileiro ) is a self-defence martial art and combat sport based on grappling, ground fighting (ne-waza) and submission holds. BJJ focuses on the skill of taking an opponent to the ground, control ...

when during one of their wrestling sessions a BJJ instructor invited him to attend a class that night at the same room. After graduating Smith trained at

Team Punishment Punishment Training Center is a mixed martial arts training camp founded in 1999 by Tito Ortiz. Also known as Punishment Athletics, the training center is headquartered in Huntington Beach, California, with a training camp located in Big Bear, ...

Mixed martial arts career

Smith had planned to attend

graduate school Postgraduate or graduate education refers to Academic degree, academic or professional degrees, certificates, diplomas, or other qualifications pursued by higher education, post-secondary students who have earned an Undergraduate education, un ...

at UCLA but did not get admitted. He decided to turn pro in MMA and accepted a fight on 2 days' notice in a regional unsanctioned event, he won the fight in 30 seconds with an

armbar An armlock in grappling is a single or double joint lock that Anatomical terms of motion#General motion, hyperextends, hyperflexes or hyperrotates the elbow, elbow joint or glenohumeral joint, shoulder joint. An armlock that hyper-extends the ...

. He had a total of 6 MMA fights and only lost 1. He decided to quit fighting after getting accepted for a job as a host for the

's show '' Fight Quest''.

Commentary career

Mixed martial arts and boxing

Smith got an audition for Fight Quest a week after his last fight and got the job. He hosted Fight Quest for 2 seasons with Doug Anderson. It last aired on October 3, 2008. After Fight Quest, he received an email from

Pride Pride is defined by Merriam-Webster as "reasonable self-esteem" or "confidence and satisfaction in oneself". A healthy amount of pride is good, however, pride sometimes is used interchangeably with "conceit" or "arrogance" (among other words) w ...

's former VP, Jerry Millen, to do an

M-1 Global M-1 Global (Mixfight-1) or MMA-1 (Mixed martial arts-1) is a mixed martial arts promotion based in St. Petersburg, Russia which organizes between 10 and 20 competitions per year. It hosted its first major show (rather than co-promoting with othe ...

show in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

as they needed a color commentator last-minute. Millen had seen Fight Quest and sent a message to both Smith and Anderson and whoever got back first would have gotten the job. He got the job and that's how he transitioned from MMA to hosting to commentating. In 2010, Smith started to be the color commentator for Bellator in season 2 after their TV-deal agreements with

Fox Sports Net Fox Sports Networks (FSN), formerly known as Fox Sports Net, was the collective name for a group of regional sports channels in the United States. Formed in 1996 by News Corporation, the networks were acquired by The Walt Disney Company on Mar ...

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

and

Telemundo Telemundo (; formerly NetSpan) is an American Spanish-language Terrestrial television, terrestrial television network owned by NBCUniversal Television and Streaming#NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, a divi ...

. In the same year, Smith started to host ''

'' for its second season. Smith co-hosted American Ninja Warrior until the third season before being replaced by Jonny Moseley for the fourth season. On March 13, 2015, Smith provided co-hosting duties together with former

boxing Boxing (also known as "Western boxing" or "pugilism") is a combat sport in which two people, usually wearing protective gloves and other protective equipment such as hand wraps and mouthguards, throw punches at each other for a predetermined ...

champion

Antonio Tarver Antonio Deon Tarver (born November 21, 1968) is an American former professional boxer and boxing commentator. In boxing he competed from 1997 to 2015, and held multiple light heavyweight world championships, including the WBA (Unified), WBC, IB ...

for

. On December 28, 2017, Bellator announced that they have parted ways with Smith after a 7-year run. On January 12, 2018, Smith signed with the

. On January 1, 2019, Smith revealed that UFC did not renew his contract as a commentator. On March 8, 2019, it was announced that Smith joined

Invicta FC Invicta Fighting Championships, also known as Invicta FC, is an American professional mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion dedicated to Women's mixed martial arts that was founded in 2012 by Janet Martin and Shannon Knapp. The promotion is current ...

as a commentator.

Professional wrestling

On May 26, 2021, WWE named Smith as play-by-play commentator for ''

Monday Night Raw ''WWE Raw'', also known as ''Monday Night Raw'' or simply ''Raw'', is an American professional wrestling television program produced by WWE that currently airs live every Monday at 8 p.m. ET on the USA Network in the United States. The show fe ...

'', replacing

Adnan Virk Adnan Virk ( ur, ) (born July 29, 1978) is a Canadian sportscaster for MLB Network and DAZN who previously worked for ESPN, TSN, and WWE. He also produces and hosts the weekly podcast ''Cinephile with Adnan Virk'' show covering cinema news and ...

. On October 6, 2022, Smith announced his departure from WWE.

Personal life

Smith has a black belt in

under Ricardo "Rey" Diogo.

Mixed martial arts record

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Jason Chambers Jason Chambers (born March 23, 1980, in Chicago, Illinois) is an American actor, mixed martial artist and sports commentator. Chambers is best known for his role as the host of the popular weekly television program '' Human Weapon'' on The Histo ...

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Hollywood, California Hollywood is a neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, California. Its name has come to be a shorthand reference for the U.S. film industry and the people associated with it. Many notable film studios, such as Columbia Pictures, ...

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San Jacinto, California San Jacinto ( ; ; Spanish for " St. Hyacinth") is a city in Riverside County, California. It is located at the north end of the San Jacinto Valley, with Hemet to its south and Beaumont, California, to its north. The mountains associated with ...

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California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

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James Wilks James Brett Wilks (born 5 April 1978) is an English film producer, vegan activist, a combatives expert and instructor, and former professional mixed martial artist. A professional from 2003 until 2012, he competed for the UFC, King of the Ca ...

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Jimmy 1977 births American color commentators American male mixed martial artists American podcasters American male sport wrestlers Amateur wrestlers Mixed martial artists from California American practitioners of Brazilian jiu-jitsu People awarded a black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu Mixed martial arts people Welterweight mixed martial artists Mixed martial artists utilizing wrestling Mixed martial artists utilizing boxing Mixed martial artists utilizing Brazilian jiu-jitsu Living people People from Fresno, California Professional wrestling announcers WWE Raw