Charles Barkley has gone haywire and trashed Kyrie Irving, the Nets, and then the NBA over the ongoing drama and according to the New York Post;
Charles Barkley, the TNT analyst and Basketball Hall of Famer, ripped the Nets and the NBA on “Inside the NBA,” hours after coach Steve Nash was fired as Brooklyn also attempts to deal with star Kyrie Irving, who drew controversy for sharing a link anti-Semitic film on social media.
“This is all on Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving and Ben Simmons. Steve Nash is a scapegoat,” Barkley said. “This thing was never going to work when [Kyrie Irving] said we don’t need a coach.”
Barkley added that the team was good during its 2021 playoff run that ultimately resulted in a second-round loss to the Milwaukee Bucks. He asserted that the criticism with Nash only started after that particular run
“Nobody was talking about how bad of a coach Steve Nash was three or four years ago,” he said. “All of the sudden these guys start acting like fools and jackasses and now Steve Nash can’t coach.”
The Nets have begun the year with an underwhelming 2-5 record, and have not yet established a team identity outside of complete chaos.
Barkley went on to assert that the NBA and commissioner Adam Silver have been far too slow to deal with Irving’s latest incident.
“I think he should have been suspended him,” Barkley said. “I think Adam should have suspended him. First of all, Adam is Jewish — you can’t take my $40 million and insult my religion. You gonna insult me, you have the right, but I have the right to say, ‘You can’t take my $40 million and insult my religion.’ I think the NBA, they made a mistake. We’ve suspended people and fined people who have made homophobic slurs. And that was the right thing to do. If you insult the Black community, you should be suspended or fined heavily.”
Barkley pointed to Timberwolves star Anthony Edwards being fined $40,000 for anti-gay remarks made on social media. In Irving’s case, the punitive measures needed to be taken sooner, Barkley said.
“Him acknowledging the Alex Jones thing, something should have happened with that too, ’cause that dude’s crazy,” he said. “I can’t believe we ain’t talking about basketball — we talking about this idiot.
“When you’re somebody as great at basketball as him, people are going to listen to what you say. I blame the NBA, he should have been suspended.”
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