Charles Barkley recently brought up Rudy Gobert‘s ‘money-money’ gesture during the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Cleveland Cavaliers matchup. At the time when the player did it, he was frustrated by the complete lack of calls he had received during the game and was insinuating that the referees weren’t giving him calls to further his own agenda. This is something Barkley revealed himself to be deeply frustrated by.
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In the aftermath of Gobert’s actions, he was quickly fined $100,000 by the NBA, something that most people deemed to be the right punishment. However, ‘the Chuckster’ felt that a deeper, more unbreakable ordinance had been trampled all over. The following is what he said on the matter during the most recent edition of TNT’s ‘Inside the NBA’,
“The one thing we can never do in sports, ever, is make people think that the game [is fixed]. If we ever get to the point, any sport, if they found out, it would ruin the sport! It would ruin the sport if people thought it was fixed. They fined Luka Doncic [for insinuating the same during a different incident], they fined Rudy Gobert before. I thought they should have suspended him.”
Charles Barkley was clearly beyond incensed by Gobert’s actions. However, $100,000 is also a lot of money, something he had to pay out of pocket for his actions. Anything beyond that would only be overkill on the NBA’s part, something Shaquille O’Neal attempted to explain to Barkley.
Having been a bruising big-bodied center during his time in the league, O’Neal knows all too well what it feels like to be fouled, but not have it called by the official. Perhaps because of this, he pointed out that the only reason Gobert made that gesture was due to the frustration of having been fouled the entire game, but seeing the referees refuse to call it.
While Barkley may feel that a heftier punishment is needed, there seem to be no signs of the authorities taking any further action against Gobert. That said, the Frenchman does have to be careful with his behavior from here on out. After all, if he makes that kind of insinuation to fans again, it wouldn’t be surprising to see him be handed a suspension after all.
