The NBA is one of the most beloved leagues in all of sports. That said, there is one thing that fans are tired of: load management. Dating back to at least 2017, paying customers would have to watch a team’s bench get more minutes than its superstar players because, at times, the big names want to take a break. Sometimes they are dealing with legitimate injuries, or do need a break.
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But when you look at the last few years of Joel Embiid and Kawhi Leonard, two of the NBA’s best players and see how many games they missed, it would make you cringe. It’s certainly making Charles Barkley cringe. The NBA legend spoke on this topic during a recent interview with ESPN.
“I would talk to the players about how important just playing is,” he told the interviewers. “We’re making 30, 40, 50 million dollars a year. You need to play basketball every game.”
Chuck explained that the fans shouldn’t be dishing out such money if they can’t see the top league names play, then jabbed at them by reminding NBA players of their very limited work schedule.
“You only working 4 days a week. You got the best medical staff ever. You got the best shoes. You don’t fly commercial. We can’t keep crapping on the public,” Chuck demanded. “They pay outrageous sums to watch us play basketball.”
The 11-time All-Star is right as rain. The amount of load management that has occurred in the league makes it hard to support the NBA at times. Even Barkley, a basketball die-hard, feels this way.
Chuck wasn’t done ripping into the modern era either. He revealed that his love of professional hockey is filling that void since those players are always thinking about the pride of the game.
“That’s one of the reasons I love hockey so much,” the 1993 MVP said. “You don’t ever hear hockey players talk about, hey, I don’t wanna play back-to-back. I saw this dude last year get 50 stitches and go back in a game. Let me tell you something. If an NBA player got 10 stitches, they would be out like a month.”
But Barkley isn’t the only NBA legend who commented on this.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar claimed he could have played for three decades with load management
Two years ago, the great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was asked about load management by fellow great Shaquille O’Neal. Cap laughed at the thought before making one of the coldest claims of his career.
“I could have played 25-30 years with load management,” he said with a laugh. “I sit home and think about that. I made a commitment to stay in shape. Season was over, I took off two weeks.”
This surprised The Diesel. “Two weeks?” asked Shaq. “I took off two months.” Kareem laughed again, but also took a moment to take in how committed he was to the game.
As a fan, you always want to see the best competition. When the NBA has its best in, there’s nothing like it in the world. But seeing how All-Star weekend was in 2024, here’s to hoping that load management finally takes a backseat to good ole-fashioned balling.
