Charles Barkley said during the NBA Finals that he would retire from television work following the 2024-25 season if TNT lost the broadcast rights to the NBA. The latter has happened, but Barkley is suddenly keeping the door open to working elsewhere.
Barkley told Andrew Marchand of The Athletic that he will retire if Turner guarantees his entire 10-year, $210 million contract. If they do not do so, he said he is willing to consider offers from ESPN, NBC, and Amazon Prime Video.
“My deal is 10 years, $210 million,” Barkley said. “Turner has to come to me ASAP and they have to guarantee my whole thing or they can offer me a pay cut, which there is no chance of that happening and I’ll be (a) free agent.
“My thing was, ‘Wait, y’all f—ed up, I didn’t f— up, why do I have to take a pay cut?”
Barkley is only in the third year of that deal, so he is essentially asking Turner to continue paying him $21 million a year for over half a decade, even though they will not have NBA rights. That seems unlikely to appeal to Turner, increasing the odds that Barkley could become a broadcasting free agent. He did make clear that, for now, he still sees retirement in his future, but that he would be “stupid” not to at least listen to what other networks might propose.
“Right now, I’m planning on retiring,” Barkley said. “I’m not trying to do anything.”
Barkley added that he remains reluctant to broadcast elsewhere without the rest of the “Inside the NBA” crew of Ernie Johnson, Kenny Smith, and Shaquille O’Neal, as well as the behind-the-scenes crew. Marchand noted in his article that a scenario has been floated in which a different network might allow the entire crew to continue doing the show from Atlanta, albeit on a different network.
Earlier Friday, Barkley criticized the NBA and its owners for perceived greed in the new TV deal. Despite that, he may not be done with the league just yet.
