Charles Barkley has spoken very highly of LeBron James throughout his remarkable 23 years in the league. Barkley considers James to be one of the three best players he’s ever seen and has long marveled at how unique he is as an athlete, because he can’t compare James with any player from the 90s.
But that doesn’t mean Barkley doesn’t have a gripe with James’ behavior at times.
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In his latest appearance on “The Bill Simmons Podcast” Sir Charles pointed out a quirk about LeBron that he’s not a fan of and explained why he thinks it’s incredibly unreasonable that The King embodies this kind of behavior.
“That’s the only thing I hate about LeBron. First of all, he’s a great, great player. He’s an amazing person, really nice guy. But for him and his guys, if you don’t say he’s the greatest ever, it’s like you commit treason,” said Barkley.
For Barkley, it doesn’t make sense
This quote from Barkley was derived from the topic he and Simmons were discussing about James’ newest commercial with Nike entitled “He is the Forever King.”
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Simmons pointed out that he doesn’t understand James’ agenda in doing this commercial, particularly the fact where it points out that the Los Angeles Lakers superstar has defeated every rival and met the expectations that were set for him since his arrival in the league.
While Simmons isn’t disputing James’ greatness, he and Barkley agreed that they don’t understand why he seems insulted to be mentioned in the same company with other legends who also get recognition as one of the GOAT’s in basketball.
“You can’t even mention Michael, Kobe, Bill Russell. I mean there’s a fraction of Kareem people. I actually feel like Kareem is the one guy who gets left out. Nobody has a better career, high school to pros, then Kareem Abdul-Jabbar,” said Barkley.
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This isn’t the first time Sir Charles has called out LeBron in public. The two have had their fair share of back-and-forths over the years, specifically during LeBron’s days with the Cleveland Cavaliers. The Hall of Famer used to point out how whiny The King was when he didn’t get what he wanted from the Cavaliers management or even the way he handled The Decision, where LeBron announced he was leaving the Cavs for the Miami Heat during his first stint with the former.
James has responded to some of Barkley’s criticism in the past by bringing up his dirty laundry as well. The two have had an up-and-down relationship over the last two decades, but their beef never went overboard.
The respect Barkley has had toward James has always been evident but he’s never afraid to call him and his agendas out.
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Barkley’s biggest problem
Besides James and his team’s behavior, Barkley is also not a fan of the pro-LeBron media, which continues to push his agenda as the greatest basketball player of all time. Hey didn’t specify names but it’s not hard to identify who these are. Barkley mentioned that these are the so-called analysts who don’t engage in genuine basketball discourse because they’re simply dismissing the history of the game in order to curry favor with James and his team.
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“It’s really sad and it pisses me off when it happens, too. It’s just people’s opinion because first of all, most of these young puns in the public, they never saw Michael Jordan play. Most of them never saw Kobe play. They definitely didn’t see Kareem or Bill Russell play, but for some reason, this generation says I’m being blasphemous,” Barkley said.
Barkley made it clear that he’s just not that type of analyst, but it’s going to be interesting to see whether or not this persona of his keeps up in the next chapter of his post-retirement career with ESPN, which is a network that’s not as liberal as TNT’s approach with “Inside the NBA” where he had all the freedom in the world to say whatever he wanted.
That show is moving to ESPN this fall, so Barkley’s behavior towards James is definitely worth monitoring moving forward.
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This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Sep 5, 2025, where it first appeared in the Latest News section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.