IF you're a sports fan -- more specifically, a basketball fan -- you may already find it hard to avoid Stephen A. Smith. He is the emerging face of hoops talk at ESPN, a fierce, confident, at times bombastic presence whose brash, clamorous style not only punctuates his reporting and analysis but sometimes eclipses them.

In less than two years at the sports media empire, the lean, goateed Mr. Smith has become one of its best-known personalities, and arguably its most renowned African-American. He may not be as well known as ESPN lifers like Chris Berman, Dick Vitale or Dan Patrick, but he makes more noise, issuing emotional, emphatic riffs about coaches, players and owners. So much noise, in fact, that he has earned the nickname Screamin' A. Smith.

"I have opinions that are based on the facts that are presented to me," he said over pancakes and eggs that he barely ate in a Midtown hotel, as his cellphone occasionally rang. "I don't apologize. I stand by it. If I'm hated, so what? If I'm loved, so what?"

That cheeky attitude has already earned Mr. Smith regular spots on "SportsCenter," an analyst's seat on three N.B.A. programs, appearances on ESPN2's "Cold Pizza" and a daily ESPN Radio program. And now, Mr. Smith's posture has prompted ESPN to make him the star of a nightly one-hour talk show on ESPN2, "Quite Frankly" (named for one of his often-repeated phrases), which makes its debut tonight at 6:30.