Already a Hall of Fame player, Charles Barkley is closing the door on his equally impressive broadcasting career with TNT Sports.
“I just want to say that I’ve talked to all the other networks, but I’m not going anywhere other than TNT,” Barkley told NBA TV on Friday night after the Dallas Mavericks’ Game 4 win over the Boston Celtics.
TNT is entering its final year in the NBA in 2024-2025 after being outbid by NBC and Amazon in a reported $76 billion deal. And unless parent company Warner Bros. Discovery can find a way into the pact at the eleventh hour, TNT Sports will soon be without NBA rights for the first time since 1988.
And even if the company can pull off a miracle, Barkley plans to limit his career at TNT to a quarter of a century: “I made the decision myself, whatever happens, next year will be my last year on television.”
The somber moment on Friday was rare for Barkley, who has entertained audiences and co-hosts with his Alabama accent for the past 24 years. The 61-year-old may be an 11-time All-Star, NBA MVP and Olympic gold medalist, but he will be best remembered as basketball’s jokester, as shown in DailyMail.com’s look back at his truly unique broadcasting career:
TNT analysts, from left to right: Shaquille O’Neal, Ernie Johnson Jr., Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley
TNT analysts Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith and Ernie Johnson talk on camera in 2010
SOME ADVICE FOR JUSSIE SMOLLETT
The co-star of Fox’s “Empire,” an actor since childhood, was caught orchestrating a hate crime hoax in 2019.
He initially said he had been attacked outside his apartment by a group of racists, but police soon discovered that Smollett had paid two Nigerian-American brothers, Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, to organize the attack.
To make matters worse, Smollett paid the couple with a check for $3,500, prompting some commentary between Barkley and co-hosts Ernie Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal and Kenny Smith.
“America, let me tell you something,” Barkley said in February 2019. “Don’t commit crimes with checks.”
It was at this time that another actor, Liam Neeson, sparked a debate by admitting to some rather racist thoughts a decade earlier, when a friend of his was allegedly attacked by a black man.
Charles Barkley advised Jussie Smollett (left) to talk to Liam Neeson (right) in 2019
If Neeson told the Independent: ‘I went back and forth through areas with a cosh, hoping that someone would approach me – I’m ashamed to say that – and I did it for maybe a week, hoping that someone [uses air quotes with fingers] ”black bastard” would come out of a pub and attack me about something, you know? So I could kill him.”
The comment gave Barkley an idea, which he passed on to Smollett on TNT.
“You wasted all that damn time and money. Do you know what you should have done? I just went to Liam Neeson’s neighborhood,” Barkley said to loud laughter from his co-hosts.
Smollett ultimately served just six days of his 150-day prison sentence for lying to Chicago police.
BARKLEY’S MEA CULPA
The Round Mound of Rebound has admittedly crossed the line over the years.
He apologized to then-NBC anchor Hannah Storm in 1997 for telling his Rockets teammates that women had nothing to do with men’s sports — a comment he later called “stupid and sexist.”
Barkley has also apologized to Beyoncé’s mother, Tina Knowles, for criticizing the “dirty water” along the coast of her native Galveston, Texas.
But for the women of another Texas city, San Antonio, Barkley’s pleas for forgiveness may not have been particularly sincere.
For Barkley, San Antonio was always a tough place to play because David Robinson and the Spurs were so scary in the 1990s. Coach Gregg Popovich continued that tradition with the Spurs after Barkley became a TNT analyst and won five NBA titles.
“Listen, listen, I’m telling you,” Barkley told his co-hosts in 2022. “You know, I think it’s a great city… I think they have the best organization in the NBA.
Chuck wasn’t done yet.
“But they do have some big old women there,” he added. “I mean, come on.”
The comment was a continuation of Barkley’s ongoing criticism of the women of San Antonio.
He did eventually issue an apology, but not one that San Antonio would have appreciated.
“I want to apologize to the women of San Antonio,” Barkley told Johnson. “Ernie, I had Churros for dinner last night.
“I understand what all the fuss is about,” he said of the fried dough. “Those damn things are good, Ernie. Those churros are good. I understand why they busted all those big women in San Antonio. Those churros are the bomb!’
IF CHUCK SAYS YOUR TEAM “SUCKS,” THEN THAT IS IT
Barkley has made a habit of telling NBA teams and their irrational fan bases that they are “bad.”
He often uses the word “terrible,” which is ridiculed by non-Alabaman viewers as “tear-bull,” but he also likes to stick to “suck” whenever possible.
And when approached by angry fans, he keeps it simple.
‘She [say]: “You think our team is worthless,” Barkley told the panel. “I only think that because they suck.”
Other times, Barkley enjoys bringing up his unscientific criticism of teams.
When the Knicks were struggling in 2018, Barkley told a humorous — and likely fictional — story to illustrate his point.
‘I left two behind [Knicks] tickets at the hotel for one of my relatives, and when I got back to the hotel there were four tickets,” Barkley joked.
In 2017, when the NBA started selling single games through its streaming app, Barkley couldn’t help but mock the lame $6.99 Bucks-Lakers matchup he was supposed to be promoting.
“Man,” Barkley interrupted Johnson, “that should be more like a $1.99 game.
“Come on, man, you’re all ripping people off!” Barley said. “If you pay $6.99 for that, you’re being fooled.”
“That should be at the dollar store.”
BARKLEY KISSING ASS
Barkley was so sure that Yao Ming, the 6-foot-4 Houston Rockets rookie, would flop in the NBA that he told Smith he would kiss his “a**” if the Chinese center scored 19 points in a competition in 2002-2003.
So when the moment inevitably came, Smith devised a plan to “buy” a donkey, thereby replacing his own butt with a real donkey.
Finally, Barkley agreed and kissed the back of the donkey on live television.
And somewhat ironically, Ming would go on to average exactly 19 points per game in his illustrious and injury-plagued career.
Barkley got into an argument with a fat Lakers fan who accused him of eating too many donuts
Don’t call Chuck “fat” unless you’re skinny
Until recently, when Barkley began losing weight on Ozempic, the Hall of Famer’s battle with the bulge was a regular topic of conversation on Inside the NBA.
Of course, Barkley can dish it out too, so O’Neil regularly catches shrapnel during these discussions.
And when a Lakers fan had the audacity to tweet a fat joke about Barkley, Sir Charles quickly turned the tables.
“@NBAonTNT Charles Barkley would choose Krispy Kreme donuts as his first choice [in the NBA Draft,’ the fan wrote on Twitter.
Inside the NBA was breaking to commercial when the post was being shared on screen, but Barkley wasn’t having any of it.
‘Look at your fat a** too,’ Barkley said after seeing an image of a rotund Lakers fan alongside the Twitter post. ‘Put that dude’s picture back up. Do not go to commercial break!
‘He gonna talk about me eating donuts? Look at his fat a**. Look at his stomach.’