Miami Heat President Pat Riley is sick and tired of people already bad-mouthing his dream team — especially Charles Barkley. While Riley has remained quiet to this point and allowed fans, coaches, and analysts to call out the Heat and their new Big Three, it appears he may have reached the boiling point. In an interview with the Sun-Sentinel on Friday, Riley called out Charles Barkley for saying LeBron James’ one-hour ESPN special was a “punk move.”
Charles Barkley, to me, went way over the top,” Riley said. “I think Charles is probably the only guy in the league that can get away with what he gets away with.
“Calling these guys a bunch of punks is a personal attack. LeBron isn’t that. Dwyane is not, and neither is Chris.”
Considering Barkley can say whatever he wants and flip off cameras and somehow keep his job, Riley has a point. But that’s just Charles being Charles, and someone like Riley should be used to that by now. He didn’t stop at Barkley, however. The former Heat coach went on to call out another former Heat coach, Stan Van Gundy for saying he didn’t know why players want to become a “lap dog” to Dwyane Wade.
Stan’s out there making comments about Chris Bosh being a lap dog to Dwyane Wade,” Riley said. “I don’t know what happened to some of these guys along the way.”
It’s good to see a team’s president sticking up for his newly acquired players, but Riley could be giving everyone what they want by sounding off. The season hasn’t even started yet and he’s already showing that negative comments are bothering him. It’s going to be a long season of insults and hatred toward the Miami Heat. If they intend to be succesful, they should probably learn to tune that stuff out all the way up and down the chain of command.
Source:
Pat Riley hits back at those who took shots at Heat [Sun-Sentinel]
