Broussard was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and is an African-American of Louisiana Creole descent. Due to his father’s job as a personnel manager for Traveler’s Insurance Co., Broussard and his family moved often during his childhood. He lived in Cincinnati, Ohio, Indianapolis, Syracuse, New York, Des Moines, Iowa, and Cleveland, Ohio, before finishing high school. In 1986, he graduated from Holy Name High School in Cleveland. A standout football and basketball player at Holy Name, Broussard was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame in 2016. He matriculated to Oberlin College, from which he graduated in May 1990 with a bachelor’s degree in English. He played point guard on the Oberlin basketball team.

In 1990, Broussard began his sports writing career for The Plain Dealer. He worked there for four years before moving to the Akron Beacon Journal where he started covering the NBA, spending two-and-a-half seasons with them as the Cleveland Cavaliers beat writer. Broussard then went on to work for The New York Times in 1998, where he covered the New Jersey Nets for two years, the New York Knicks for three years, and the NBA in general for one year. In September 2004 Broussard joined ESPN The Magazine.

In 2004, in addition to his writing duties, Broussard began making regular appearances on ESPN as an NBA insider and analyst, and occasionally as a panelist on First Take debating sports topics with Skip Bayless. For the 2011–12 NBA season, Broussard was added to ABC’s NBA Countdown pregame show as an NBA insider. He also spent three years as a sideline reporter for nationally-televised games on ESPN and ABC.

In April 2013, Broussard was criticized for comments he made on an ESPN Outside the Lines program about NBA player Jason Collins coming out as homosexual. Broussard had expressed his views on homosexuality and other sexual behaviors which he characterized as sins, stating “If you’re openly living in unrepentant sin…I believe that’s walking in open rebellion to God.” He later released a statement clarifying his remarks, saying that he had merely offered his “personal opinion as it relates to Christianity,” and conceded that he realizes “that some people disagree with my opinion and I accept and respect that.”

In 2018, Broussard became co-host of a daily national radio show called The Odd Couple. His co-host is Rob Parker (sports journalist), another FS1 sports analyst. The Odd Couple can be heard on FOX Sports Radio and Sirius XM Channel 83.