Charles Barkley was recently part of the ESPN and TNT crossover, covering the NBA In-Season Tournament, where he got an opportunity to speak to former Golden State Warriors GM Bob Myers. The 48-year-old executive left the Warriors in May 2023 and has since then been working with ESPN as a contributor. Stephen Curry and Co. have had an ordinary start to the season this year, prompting Barkley to troll Myers about abandoning a sinking ship.
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Barkley called the Warriors the Titanic, suggesting that they were on their way down, and wanted to give ‘credit’ to Myers for departing the organization at the right time. The comments eventually made their way to Klay Thompson, who was ironically asked about them after the Warriors’ loss to OKC Thunder, as reported in The Athletic.
Thompson initially claimed that he had not heard what Chuck had said. When told about the remark, he had a rather straightforward response. Thompson stated that he believes Barkley is guilty of not giving the Warriors as much credit as they clearly deserve, for a while now.
“The only frustration with that is will this guy [Barkley] ever give us any credit? You know how hard this is to do? Annually? You’d think Charles would understand how hard it is to win a championship,” he said, clearly referring to the fact that Barkley was never able to land a championship in his successful individual career.
Thompson further claimed that Barkley was guilty of jumping the gun on them, especially considering the history of the Warriors’ core group. “And we’re still here. What are we — 10 and 12? There’s 60 freaking regular season games left. But he’s been hating on us since 2015. So this is no surprise,”
The Warriors are currently 10-12, standing 11th in the Western Conference table. The team has shown flashes of brilliance like they generally do but has been guilty of not maintaining momentum and committing easy turnovers consistently. Still, as Klay pointed out, there are exactly 60 Regular Season games to go, and there’s plenty of time for the Warriors to get going.
Charles Barkley has been a regular critic of the Golden State Warriors
It seems as if Chuck is firmly of the opinion that the best days of the Warriors are long gone. While that may be true, Thompson and Co. will argue they have plenty left in the tank to once again emerge as championship contenders.
Barkley has already been heard calling the Warriors ‘cooked’ multiple times since the start of the season. However, the kind of quality they still possess warrants that the comments are bound to give them further impetus to get going.
That, especially pertains to Klay Thompson, who Barkley had thought was not going to be the same player once he returned from injury. While Chuck later claimed he had meant that age and injuries were bound to have a toll, Thompson had reacted strongly that time as well to Barkley’s comments. He talked about how he had torn his ACL in consecutive years and still helped his team win the 2022 NBA Championship.
Barkley, who had later claimed he was disappointed to see Thompson react the way he did, simply stated that the player had misunderstood his comments. Whatever may be the case, Chuck’s recent comments about the Warriors certainly suggest that his initial criticism of Klay also had a certain bias, as Thompson claimed to have consistently felt.
