{"id":712103,"date":"2026-04-17T00:21:34","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T00:21:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/712103\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T00:21:34","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T00:21:34","slug":"stephen-a-smith-urges-charles-barkley-to-do-better","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/712103\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen A. Smith urges Charles Barkley to ‘do better’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stephen A. Smith maintains he didn\u2019t do anything wrong by calling LeBron James out for his Memphis comments, but Charles Barkley may have screwed up.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, James faced criticism for mocking Memphis and Milwaukee during an appearance with\u00a0Bob Does Sports. James alleged that most NBA stars agree the Grizzlies should move to Nashville, adding that he has no desire to stay at a Hyatt in Memphis<\/a> on a random weeknight during the regular season.<\/p>\n

Smith may not have taken issue with the comments last year, when he himself controversially alleged that NBA players aren\u2019t comfortable playing in Memphis. He may not even have taken issue with the comments last month, when he suggested Nashville should get an NBA team. But when James essentially echoed the complaint about Memphis as an NBA city, Smith accused him of being insensitive<\/a> for putting down an area with a large Black community, especially while on a show hosted by white content creators.<\/p>\n

Barkley, however, had less of an issue with James claiming he doesn\u2019t like Memphis, and more of an issue with Smith and others for what he believes was rage baiting<\/a> by invoking race into the conversation.<\/p>\n

\u201cLeBron said something about Memphis and the world took over, they made it about race, which is what anybody does when they want to stir up controversy. Y\u2019all are successful!\u201d Barkley said on The Steam Room podcast. \u201cStephen A., you\u2019re one of the most successful people we have in television. Come on, man. Y\u2019all got to do better, man.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith heard Barkley\u2019s mini rant, and it set him off on a rant of his own, claiming the Inside the NBA analyst didn\u2019t understand the full context of the discussion before interjecting to defend LeBron.<\/p>\n

\ufeff
\u201cRespectfully, Charles Barkley, you have to do better,\u201d Smith declared Wednesday afternoon during his Mad Dog Sports Radio show on SiriusXM. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you listen to the substance of what\u2019s being said before you have a comment about it and really dissect it?\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith went on to note that Barkley has previously pushed back on politicians and people in power, all in the name of defending the poor. And that\u2019s what Smith claims to be doing by criticizing James for his comments on Memphis.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe didn\u2019t just say, \u2018I don\u2019t like the city of Memphis.\u2019 He went into detail about how the team should leave. How the NBA should relocate it to Nashville,\u201d Smith explained of LeBron\u2019s comments in question.<\/p>\n

While Smith has had his issues with James, he repeatedly stated how much love and respect he has for Barkley throughout this rant. But Smith took issue with Barkley being critical without inviting him on the podcast to defend his position.<\/p>\n

Without an NFL, MLB, or NHL team in Memphis, Smith believes losing its NBA team would be detrimental to a city with a population that is 63.5% Black, which is why LeBron\u2019s comments struck a nerve. The problem, however, is that Smith was the one who was making headlines for ripping Memphis as an NBA city just a year ago. Smith seems to believe he can say NBA players don\u2019t like Memphis, but LeBron James can\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stephen A. Smith maintains he didn\u2019t do anything wrong by calling LeBron James out for his Memphis comments,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":712104,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3795],"tags":[7,2001,294,185,293,177,4070,6,2603],"class_list":{"0":"post-712103","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-memphis-grizzlies","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-charles-barkley","10":"tag-grizzlies","11":"tag-lebron-james","12":"tag-memphis","13":"tag-memphis-grizzlies","14":"tag-memphisgrizzlies","15":"tag-nba","16":"tag-stephen-a-smith"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116417193286214217","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712103","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=712103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712103\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/712104"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=712103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=712103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=712103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}