Despite being a great prospect, Charles Barkley came into the league slightly overweight. He soon realized the importance of being fit in order to succeed. However, this wasn’t his mentality during his college days. As a member of the Auburn Tigers, Barkley admitted to having 100 pizzas in 200 days and revealed that he found there to be no need for him to shed weight due to his on-court prowess.
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In an appearance on Shannon Sharpe’s Club Shay Shay podcast, Charles Barkley detailed his college experience. Sharpe kickstarted the conversation by listing down all of Chuck’s impressive achievements from his three years in college and seemed to be in disbelief that the latter was able to put up surreal stats despite weighing 300 lbs.
Charles exclaimed, “When you got to Auburn, you weighed 300 lbs. The first 200 days in college, is reported that you ordered 100 pizzas. But, you led the SEC in rebounding in your three years that you were there. You hold the record for the career field goal percentage at almost 63%, you was SEC Player of the Year and the Decade of the 80s, and you’re a member of the Auburn All-Century Team. How the hell do you do that at 300 lbs?”
Barkley was used to being a member of great teams in his high school and college. Apart from the team’s consistent performance, Sir Charles’ recording impressive numbers on a nightly basis led to him never deep-diving into his flaws. On the basis of nothing more than sheer “talent”, the TNT analyst claimed that he was able to dominate the boards, leading the SEC in rebounding in each of the three years.
“Man, I had some serious talent to be honest with you… I’m probably the only freshman to ever lead to SEC in rebounding and then I led it every year so I’m not thinking about flaws. I think I’m doing pretty good. So, I’m not thinking about ‘yo man, lose weight’. I’m like ‘yo, I’m all SEC, I’m leading the league in rebounding as a freshman, as a sophomore, as a junior. I’m good’,” Barkley revealed.
Sir Charles also disclosed that he got into a disagreement with his coach regarding his weight. Eventually, Barkley did apologize to him knowing that the Auburn head coach had his best interest in mind.
“My coach tried to get me to lose weight and we fought a little bit early in my career. We’re really close today because I had to go back and apologize I said ‘you know what you were right, I was wrong. I should have lost weight sooner, I could have been better’. But you know when you’re 18 and having success you don’t think anything,” Barkley concluded.
Professional athletes, even those that played in far older eras often required their bodies to be in the best shape imaginable to see success. However, as Barkley put it, he was so talented that this initially didn’t apply to him. Of course, eventually, he realized the importance of being in shape. But, while he was still overweight, Barkley was so successful that he even earned a bit of an iconic nickname during his time in college.
Origin of Charles Barkley’s nickname “The Round Mound of Rebound”
Charles Barkley was referred to by multiple nicknames over his illustrious career. ‘Sir Charles’, ‘The Chuckster’, ‘The Prince of Pizza’, and ‘The Chuck Wagon’ were merely a few of them. However, none of them are as iconic as “The Round Mound of Rebound”.
The Round Mound of Rebound was one of the oldest nicknames given to Barkley that stuck throughout his career. As the name suggests, the 6ft 6” star’s rebounding prowess during his college led to one of the most memorable nicknames.
“I think by the end of my sophomore year, I was leading the league in rebounding again,” Barkley said, per AL.com. “I think that’s when it switched to ‘Round Mound of Rebound.’ They were doing anything to drum up support.”
The media and fans fell in love with the moniker and Barkley’s lively personality resonated with the same. Hence, among the several nicknames – The Crisco Kid, The Wide Load from Leeds, and others – that he received in college, The Round Mound of Rebound has stuck to this day.
