Tuesday: Charles Barkley voices concern over shows move to ESPN

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
This week, the Eastern Conference Finals will be on tn
T and it will also mark the end of the
of the what is it forty year run that the
NBA has been on tn T going back to the
mid eighties. As when the when the Western Conference Finals ends,
Kenny and Barkley and Shaq and Ernie Johnson will do

(00:30):
their final episode on tn T that postgame show and
I guess also partial pregame show is going to move
to ESPN, although it will be produced by the people
in Atlanta that I think it's Paramount and Time and
Time Warner that do that, and they put that they'll
just send the programming to ESPN. Barkley says that ESPN

(00:51):
has not quote unquote led to me yet. Here's the
thing that I think Barkley is concerned about, although I
don't really think he should be, seeing that the ESPN
allows Pat McAfee to pretty much do whatever he wants,
and then they just run a disclaimer that this isn't
our really really our show. We're just gonna gravy train
off the money they're paying us to put it on
the platform. Obviously, ESPN is owned by Disney. Disney is

(01:16):
very sensitive to any opinion that any of their hosts
have they if you if you believe Sage Steel, she
was was was removed there for her opinions on stuff
that didn't seem to be too controversial. But as far
as they were concerned that it was well Nicholl, Yeah,

(01:37):
Rachel Nichols was in the in the in the same boat.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (01:40):
And but Barkley is in a unique position because here's
the here's where Barkley has the leverage.

Speaker 2 (01:49):
Number one.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
Anybody that says things that are racially insensitive, that are
socially insensitive, there's no there's no place for that.

Speaker 2 (01:55):
We got to get past all of that.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
But everybody's going to have an opinion on other topics,
whether it's political or religious or social or whatever. And
it's okay to have an opinion, and it's okay to
disagree with the opinion, but it's not okay to say, well,
I'm never gonna like you again and we're gonna not
be friends because we have different opinions on things that

(02:19):
really don't matter, we just have different opinions on them.
And Charles Barkley is very he's very polarizing at times
with his comments on certain subjects.

Speaker 2 (02:31):
He's brutally honest.

Speaker 1 (02:33):
He's brutally honest, and a lot of people don't want
to deal with honesty, and he doesn't deal with people
that don't have common sense very often as well. If
somebody says something stupid, he's gonna call him out for that.

Speaker 2 (02:45):
He's lost friendships over that.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
Him and Michael Jordan don't talk anymore because he said
mj is a bad owner for allowing people that just
agree with everything he does to be a part of
his staff, and that he needs to have a philosophy
that it's okay to disagree with me if you think
I'm wrong, because that's how you get to be better,
is to be challenged by people that have different opinions

(03:08):
than you do. And so I think that. But my
here's my thought. I think Ernie Johnson is one of
the best studio hosts that there's ever been, and he's
pretty good at doing baseball play by play when TNT
does games in the playoffs, and Kenny Smith is a
great analyst and Shack is turned into one.

Speaker 2 (03:30):
But the star of that show is Barkley.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
And if Barkley ever walks off the set and says,
I don't care how much you're paying me.

Speaker 2 (03:35):
I'm out that show goes away.

Speaker 1 (03:37):
That show thrives and survives because of Charles Barkley. So
I'm sure ESPN is going to give him all the
leverage that are, all the leeway that he needs in
order to do what he wants. But he is gonna
I don't think he will worry about crossing any lines
at ESPN because if they don't like what he says,

(04:01):
too bad.

Speaker 2 (04:01):
I'm going to do what I want.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
And I think he's always been fair with his opinions
and his criticisms. I don't think he's ever said something
that it's been demonizing to somebody else. I don't think
he's picked fights with other people when it comes to
what his comments are on certain topics. He's been really
heavy on the load management thing. We played basketball for
a living. We're not first responders. We're not we're not

(04:25):
doctors that are making sure people live through a tragedy.
We're playing basketball for two hours, three nights a week.
Get off your rear and go play basketball. You don't
need to load manage a lot of people don't like that.
And he say, you know, he said he's had some
opinions on gender issues and things like that that people
may or may not like, but in his mind he's
right and he doesn't care if you're if you disagree

(04:46):
with him or not. So this will be the last
week that he's on TNT, and tn T has always
let him do what he wants. My guess is his
ESPN will until that quartette of host decides they don't
want to do the show anymore.

Speaker 3 (05:00):
Yeah, I mean when they let the idiot, uh you know,
tank top wearing punter say what he says? What's wrong
with with McAfee? He's all right, he's terrible, he's terrible.
He provides nothing. But he's a side show sideshow clown
to me as all he is. And but when they

(05:23):
have when they have guys like that, and even to
a certain extent, Steven A.

Speaker 2 (05:28):
Smith, you know, Steven A. Smith's at times says he
may be the next president. He well, he may be.

Speaker 3 (05:34):
He says a lot of stupid, controversial things at times
just to say it.

Speaker 1 (05:40):
So that's where they see him doing that as much.
He used to do that a lot, especially when he
had the radio show. He did that a lot. But
I still kind of does I intending to like a
lot of what I hear from steven A Smith, I.

Speaker 3 (05:53):
Don't because I think a lot of it is just
I'm going to see what I can say that's gonna
tick people off. To remember the Lebron situation, the quote
unquote altercation running that he had with him and then
called him out, and then what two days later backtracked and.

Speaker 1 (06:10):
Correct, Bronny's in the league because Lebron got him in
the league.

Speaker 2 (06:13):
True.

Speaker 3 (06:14):
True, But then steven A backtracked and ran away with
this taiale between his legs and was like, I'm sorry, Lebron,
Hew Dre, I criticize you.

Speaker 1 (06:21):
Yeah, But he never criticized Lebron. He criticized the fact
that he doesn't think that Brony's good enough to play
in the NBA, and ninety nine percent of every basketball
person on the planet agrees with that. Lebron and Genie
Buss are the only two that I disagree that he
can play in the NBA, and someday he may be,
but he either should still be at USC or he

(06:43):
should be permanently in the G league until he's good
enough to get there. Just because you're the son of
a legend doesn't mean you get to have a spot
on a roster unless you're Lebron and that you know,
we were joking a little bit last week when Becky
signed with Cluge Sports. I'd signed with Cledge Sports if
they wanted me to sign for something. Guess what they
get their athletes paid, they get their clients paid.

Speaker 2 (07:05):
I'm all on board for that.

Speaker 1 (07:06):
But the problem when clutched Sports has everybody is that
they get to make the rules, or Lebron gets to
make the rules, and that's where you have when you
have a monopoly, that's when it gets, you know, a
little bit out of hand. And unfortunately that's where Clutch
Sports is. Clutch Sports had as much to do with
Ronnie getting in the league as Lebron did, and Jennie

(07:29):
Buss was not going to tell Lebron no. And that
goes back to what will Lebron's future be? Is he
going to surround himself with people that always tell him
yes and that he's never wrong, or is he going
to have people around him that actually challenge him to
be better?

Speaker 3 (07:41):
Yeah, Well, that's why I think that at this point,
Charles Barkley really doesn't have to worry about what he
says unless he absolutely just really puts something controversial out there.
But when when ESPN has to do with McAfee and
all of those idiots, and then and Stephen A. Smith
and Kendrick Perkins. I think Charles Barkley will be all right.

(08:05):
I think he'll be all right.

Speaker 1 (08:06):
All right, excuse me, We've got to ask genty news.
We've got Cooper Flag News and Tyrese Haliburton's doing something
really special for a fan that shouldn't have had it
happen to him in the first place. We'll tell you
what that is next. It's the Andy Everage show. On
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