Charles Barkley called out Los Angeles Lakers coach JJ Redick for criticizing the NBA media amid the league-wide discussion about ratings.
The NBA has suffered from a severe ratings decline to start the 2024-25 season. As reported by Yahoo Sports in early December, viewership for ESPN’s NBA broadcasts was down 28% as of Nov. 21.
Through much of December, countless notable figures around the league chimed in to give their perspective on why the NBA is losing viewers. Some — like Barkley and Shaquille O’Neal — have been especially harsh in their criticism, outright calling the current era of the NBA a bad product while listing off a variety of issues with the on-court play.
Redick, on the other hand, took aim at media figures for constantly speaking negatively about the NBA and rarely celebrating the positives — much like Barkley and O’Neal do.
On Thursday night’s episode of Inside the NBA, Barkley responded by once again calling the NBA product “crappy” and predicting that Redick would soon lose his job.
“He said something about we’re the reason people ain’t watching this crappy product we got,” Barkley said. “Yeah, us, like we’re out there jacking up a hundred threes. JJ, if you come for the king, you better not miss because I can get you, brother. Remember, I got you your Lakers games. You can’t hide
“You’re just a dead man walking!” Barkley continued. “They got rid of Frank Vogel, who did a good job. They got rid of Darvin Ham, who did a good job — but you came out there thinking you were gonna change things with that same ugly girl you went on a date with.”
Host Ernie Johnson interjected to try to bring the discussion back to the game they had just watched, but Barkley wouldn’t let up.
“Lakers stink!” Barkley continued. “He came in there thinking, ‘I can make this thing work.’ Hell you can! Better put some makeup on that pig. The Lakers stink, man. Come on, man.”
Watch above via TNT.