2 weeks Ago By Reign Amurao, Hardwood Heroics
Former NBA star Charles Barkley has never been a fan of load management. Barkley doesn’t usually hold his thoughts on load management, often criticizing players who exercise the practice. The former Philadelphia 76ers appeared as a guest on the “Dan Patrick Show,” where he spoke against load management.
In the Friday installment of the show, Barkley was asked what he thought was the league’s biggest problem. Dan Patrick , the host, made the former player choose between the high volume of 3-pointers or load management. The Hall of Fame player has criticized the 3-point revolution in the NBA in addition to load management.
He did note, though, that the league suffers more when players choose to miss particular games. Chuck claimed that given how unavailable they are all season long, the amount of money these famous athletes earn is unfair. “What’s gonna be the biggest problem going forward when we have guys making $80, $90, $100 million not playing back-to-back games,” Charles Barkley said.
“When that new TV deal kicks in next year, and you got a guy making $85 million an he says, ‘Hey, you know what, I’m not going to play back-to-back games.’ It’s ridiculous to think fans are gonna pay as much as it cost to go to games now and now you gonna have to go out and start doing streaming going forward.” Chuck criticized players with max contracts who don’t show up and avoid playing a certain number of games.
“We can’t have a guy making $95 million saying, ‘I can’t play basketball four days a week.’ That’s infairness, most teams play three games a week. But let’s say hyopothetically, you play four games, you can’t ask fans to pay that money for a guy making $95 million [and] won’t play back-to-back games.
If anybody thinks that’s a good idea, they’re crazy.” Barkley’s remarks followed the Sixers’ announcement about their top player Joel Embiid . To protect their franchise star from injury, the organization declared at the beginning of the season that Embiid would not play back-to-back games.
Charles Barkley didn’t hold back in his criticism of Embiid The 2024-25 NBA season has started but Embiid hasn’t logged a minute for the Sixers. According to the team, the All-Star has been out as they continue to manage his injury. Charles Barkley is among the many who have spoken about the star’s absence .
During the Oct. 24 episode of “Inside the NBA,” Barkley took a shot at the 2023 MVP. “I don’t think it’s fair,” Barkley said.
“I want to get this number right. He just signed for three years, $193 million to play basketball. We’re not steel workers, we’re not nurses.
People who got real jobs have to work 40-50 hours a week. We’re playing basketball, at the most, four days a week.” "We're not steel workers, we're not nurses.
.. we're playing basketball, at the most, four days a week.
" Embiid's load management isn't flying with Chuck pic.twitter.com/PC2HZd9HwK — NBA on TNT (@NBAonTNT) October 24, 2024 Since announcing their plans to limit Embiid this season, the NBA has started an investigation and fined the franchise $100k for “inconsistent” statements on the star’s injury.
This article first appeared on Hardwood Heroics and was syndicated with permission..
