{"id":558932,"date":"2026-01-25T01:32:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-25T01:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/558932\/"},"modified":"2026-01-25T01:32:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-25T01:32:13","slug":"charles-barkley-gets-honest-on-kuminga-after-warriors-injury-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/558932\/","title":{"rendered":"Charles Barkley gets honest on Kuminga after Warriors injury news"},"content":{"rendered":"

Charles Barkley gets honest on Kuminga after Warriors injury news<\/a> originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/a>. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Charles Barkley isn\u2019t one to keep his true thoughts under wraps.<\/p>\n

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Recently, the legendary NBA player was asked about his thoughts on the Golden State Warriors<\/a> forward, Jonathan Kuminga.<\/p>\n

Now that Kuminga is expected to be back in the Warriors\u2019 rotation in the wake of Jimmy Butler\u2019s season-ending injury, some may wonder if the opportunity could salvage the relationship between the player and the team for the remainder of the 2025-2026 season.<\/p>\n

Barkley strongly denies that it will happen.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat relationship is over. It\u2019s really unfortunate that Jimmy Butler got hurt. He\u2019s a terrific guy and a terrific player. The Kuminga thing is over!\u201d Barkley said clearly<\/a>. \u201cHe\u2019s only playing because Jimmy got hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n

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For the outsiders looking in, the situation has been a bit puzzling. It was clear the Warriors weren\u2019t sold on Kuminga long-term, but they still signed him to a two-year deal, with plans to potentially move on before the February trade deadline.<\/p>\n

Steve Kerr rolled out Kuminga as a starter throughout the first month of the season before taking him out of the rotation. Prior to Jimmy Butler\u2019s injury, he was consistently collecting DNPs for the Warriors. In the two games since Butler\u2019s injury, Kuminga has been rolled out in both games.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey must not think he can play,\u201d Barkley added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know [if he can], I haven\u2019t seen enough of him. They know him better than anybody. When they did not extend him, like all of the other rookies were extended, then he had the contentious contract negotiations. They didn\u2019t want to pay him. On the outside looking in, they know something.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In his first game back, Kuminga scored 20 points in 21 minutes against the Toronto Raptors<\/a>. During the second outing against the Dallas Mavericks<\/a>, Kuminga checked in for just nine minutes. He produced 10 points while grabbing just one rebound and passing out two assists.<\/p>\n

Currently, Kuminga has an active trade request submitted to the Warriors. The team\u2019s front office leader, Mike Dunleavy, made it clear that the market is lacking for the forward. There is a chance Kuminga could find a change of scenery before the February deadline. Barkley seems to hope that\u2019s the case.<\/p>\n

For the time being, the young forward will have to continue driving up his value during limited minutes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Charles Barkley gets honest on Kuminga after Warriors injury news originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":558933,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,2001,149,164,313,867,476],"class_list":{"0":"post-558932","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-charles-barkley","10":"tag-dallas-mavericks","11":"tag-golden-state-warriors","12":"tag-jimmy-butler","13":"tag-jonathan-kuminga","14":"tag-toronto-raptors"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115953162766706479","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=558932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558932\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/558933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=558932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=558932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=558932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}