ESPN NBA analyst Kendrick Perkins made waves last month when he criticized TNT’s Shaquille O’Neal and Charles Barkley for the duo’s dismissal of the New York Knicks as a viable threat in the Eastern Conference.
“Obviously they don’t watch basketball,” Perkins said at the time on The Michael Kay Show. “I’m serious, they can’t watch basketball on a consistent basis. The only time they actually probably watch the Knicks are when they’re covering the Knicks on their game nights.”
Barkley and O’Neal had fun with Perkins’s verbal shot at them, as they put the NBA analyst’s face on a punching bag and punched it on live television during Inside the NBA. Barkley appeared on the Club Shay Shay podcast this week with Shannon Sharpe to discuss the beef between himself and Perkins.
“Yeah it doesn’t bother me because we take shots at players,” Barkley said. “The only problem I had with what Kendrick says…there’s nobody in the world who watches more basketball than me. And I had just come out of March Madness, which pissed me off even more because I was watching two or three college basketball games a day. March Madness really sucks because I’m watching games all day long. But to say other guys don’t watch the games…”
“Because he has a different opinion than yours,” Sharpe chimed in.
“Yeah,” Barkley replied. “So that’s the only thing that bothered me. There’s nobody in the world that watches more basketball than me. But I don’t get mad. The thing that’s really funny about it…Shaq is so sensitive at times. I was gonna like let it go and he’s like, ‘Nah, nah, nah! My momma told me growing up we kill all roaches!'”
Barkley will continue to make his thoughts felt on the NBA unapologetically as the playoffs continue, whether Perkins likes the opinions or not.
