Charles Barkley Uses Shaquille O’Neal’s ‘Asleep’ Accusation To Promote His Weight Loss Sponsorship

Joseph Galizia | 04/05/2025
Charles Barkley (L), Shaquille O'Neal (R)

No one will rag on you more than your friends. That has never been more clear than the relationship between Shaquille O’Neal and Charles Barkley. The Diesel pulled another infamous move on his good friend Chuck and posted a video on his Instagram, throwing shade at his NBA on TNT co-host for essentially falling asleep while on set filming a commercial.

“This is Detective O’Neal. I have a question,” stated Shaq in his video, where he’s filming a TV that has Barkley on the screen. He then asked his 35.1 million followers, “Was Charles Barkley asleep in this commercial?” The Hall of Famer then zoomed in to show Barkley with his eyes closed, sitting peacefully. “He’s asleep. He’s definitely sleep,” added fellow commercial detective Kenny Smith, who was watching and also laughing at the screen.

The trolling by Shaq didn’t stop Barkley from getting some revenge, and what sweet revenge it was. Chuck took to the comments section of the video and jokingly plugged his partnership with Ro, the telehealth company he’s being endorsed by.

“Don’t sleep on Ro.Co,” he wrote, and added a laughing emoji that either was an admission that he did sleep or a reaction to how proud he was of his own response.

As funny as the back-and-forth was, it does show that Chuck does put a value on health. Barkley is going on a weight loss journey thanks to Ro’s services, and he’s taking every opportunity to plug the brand, even when it’s a silly exchange with his buddies.

Funnily enough, this wasn’t the first time that Barkley and the NBA on TNT crew butted heads over weight. Six months earlier, Barkley revealed to the crew that he was taking the weight loss drug Mounjaro, which many use for diabetes. The only thing was that Chuck didn’t have diabetes. He was just using Mounjaro to shed some excess pounds.

I think we can all agree that Barkley does look great. However, he’s not beating the falling asleep allegations, especially since it has happened before.

Chuck famously fell asleep during an NBA on TNT broadcast

Nine years ago, Barkley was a younger man, but his habit of shutting his eyes when he was getting a little sleepy had already started to take shape. Chuck famously fell asleep during an NBA on TNT broadcast. Good thing Shaq told the producers to put a camera on him so they could forever capture the moment.

The boys obviously gave Barkley an earful. “It ain’t even that late,” shouted Kenny. “I’m the only one of you that works out,” responded Chuck as he sipped his coffee, unaffected.

“I got a new word for you, narcolepsy,” joked O’Neal. It didn’t really seem to matter what Chuck said after that. He’s probably had over 1,000 other viral moments on the famed basketball broadcast since, but some people never forget. Shaq is one of those people.

Post Edited By: Sameen Nawathe
Charles Barkley Kenny Smith Shaquille O'Neal

About the author

Joseph Galizia

Joseph is a Las Vegas based actor and circus performer. For the last seven years he's had the pleasure of covering sports for multiple outlets, including the Lifestyles section of Sports Illustrated. In that time, he's conducted over 50 interviews with athletes, filmmakers, and company founders to further cement his footprint in the journalism world. He's excited to bring that skillset to the SportsRush, where he'll be covering the NBA news cycle.

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