ESPN's Stephen A Smith fires back at Charles Barkley after warning about being overexposed
ESPN star Stephen A. Smith fired back at Charles Barkley over the warning the Basketball Hall of Famer gave to the sports personality about being overexposed in the media.
Smith prefaced his remarks on his podcast by saying he had a respect and appreciation for Barkley, suggesting the two were very close.
"That's my guy, but that doesn't mean I always agree with him. And it doesn't mean that I'm devoid of the right to call him a flaming hypocrite when it's called upon," Smith said on "The Stephen A. Smith Show." "Do y'all know how many commercials Charles Barkley does a year? He'll tell us two. Have you seen Charles Barkley in two commercials? Are you kidding me? Oh, by the way, the cat that you work with at least twice a week during the NBA season is Shaquille O'Neal.
"Can we count the amount of endorsements he has? How often he's seen everywhere? What new product he's pitching? Did you say that about him? No, you didn't. But when it comes to me, I need to be 'careful.'"
Smith wanted to get to the "heart of the matter."
"And this isn't directed at Charles Barkley. This is directed at all the folks out there – I'm making people out there – I'm making people very uncomfortable, and I don't give s---," Smith said. "You can talk about people not taking me seriously all you want to, we'll see, because I'm a serious brotha. That doesn't mean I don't know how to laugh and smile and have fun, you know who the hell I am."
Barkley made his remarks during an appearance on OutKick's "Don't @ Me with Dan Dakich."
The former Philadelphia 76ers star said he would not vote for Smith for president before warning Smith that people could get "sick" of him.
"I was in the studio last night and I saw he was going to be on 'Law & Order' tonight. I mean he is already on 'General Hospital,' he's already on 'General Hospital,' now he is going to be on 'Law & Order' tonight, and I was just laughing. I was like, 'Yo man, you are starting to be too much right now,'" Barkley said.
"Like, you are going to be on CNN, you are going to be on 'Fox & Friends,' now you on 'General Hospital,' now you on 'Law & Order,' I'm like, 'Yo man, knock it off. Stop being on every TV show' because at some point people are going to get sick of you, and you are going to be like, 'Yeah I probably did too much.' But once you do too much, it's too late and people don't take you serious, and I think he's got to be careful in that aspect."
Barkley said he wants to be on TV less and less, because "less is more."
"My friends close to me give me a lot of credit, and I'm not blowing my own horn, I want to be on TV as less as possible, to be honest with you Dan. That's why I only do a couple commercials a year. I don't go on a bunch of shows, less is more, because the more you do, the less people take you serious. And I don't feel the need to grab every dime, I don't feel the need to grab every dime at my disposal," Barkley said.
"I've been arguing with my agent, he said we could do five-seven commercials a year, I said we are going to do two commercials a year, that's it. I don't want to be on TV all the time. I get sick of seeing myself do March Madness, but I don't want to be on TV all the time and I don't do a bunch of TV stuff because I don't want to – people get sick of you, that's my number one thing. People will get sick of you, so I don't want to be on TV more, I want to be on TV less."
Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
12 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Magic Johnson Brings Back NBA Playoffs Claim After Pacers' Win
Magic Johnson Brings Back NBA Playoffs Claim After Pacers' Win originally appeared on Athlon Sports. The Indiana Pacers have been the little engine that could throughout this year's NBA playoffs. They finished a modest fourth place in the Eastern Conference during the regular season, but over the last several weeks, they have turned into a growing nightmare. Advertisement They upset the Cleveland Cavaliers, who had won 64 games, in the second round of the playoffs, and they then brushed past the New York Knicks, who had just knocked off the defending NBA champion Boston Celtics. Coming into the NBA Finals against the mighty Oklahoma City Thunder, Indiana wasn't given much of a chance. But the legendary Magic Johnson warned that the Thunder "should be worried" about Indiana in a post on X on Wednesday. Sure enough, the team erased a 15-point fourth-quarter deficit and took Game 1 of the championship series on a game-winning jumper by Tyrese Haliburton. Johnson took to X afterward to remind everyone of the Pacers' prowess on the road in the postseason this year. "Remember what I said… the Pacers beat every team they've faced on the road during the Playoffs and they kept that streak going tonight against OKC!" Johnson wrote. Game 1 of the finals continues a pattern of the Pacers coming from behind in the final minutes to steal a game on the road early in a series. Indiana Pacers' point guard Tyrese Haliburton© Trevor Ruszkowski-Imagn Images They came back after being down 119-112 with less than a minute left in Game 2 versus Cleveland to win on a 3-pointer by Haliburton just before time expired. Advertisement Then, in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals, they bounced back from a double-digit deficit with less than three minutes left in the fourth quarter and forced overtime on a buzzer-beater by Haliburton that bounced high off the rim and went through the net. They then prevailed in overtime by three points. Now, after Thursday's shocking win over the Thunder, the Pacers winning their first NBA championship is a distinct possibility. This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on Jun 6, 2025, where it first appeared.
CBS News
37 minutes ago
- CBS News
T.J. and Megan McConnell swap jerseys before Game 1 of NBA Finals
T.J. and Megan McConnell are known to have strong sibling love and on Thursday night, they supported each other's basketball journeys from afar. The brother-sister duo showed up to their respective games wearing each others jerseys as T.J. was making his first appearance in the NBA Finals in Oklahoma City. Megan was sidelined with injury from the Phoenix Mercury's game against the Golden State Valkyries. Both T.J. and Megan were star players at Chartiers Valley before going on to play college basketball at Duquesne University and entering the NBA and WNBA, respectively. When T.J. showed up to the Paycom Center for Game 1 of the NBA Finals, he did so wearing Megan's Mercury jersey. Your brother wearing your rookie pro jersey to his first @NBA Finals game is such a flex 😎 — Phoenix Mercury (@PhoenixMercury) June 5, 2025 Earlier this week, Megan signed a contract with the Mercury, becoming just one of three active duos in the NBA and WNBA of brother-sister combinations. Megan made her WNBA debut earlier this week, scoring three points during 13 minutes of playing time before she suffered a knee injury and is now expected to be sidelined for several weeks. Even though she was sidelined for Thursday night's Phoenix game, she showed up wearing T.J.'s Pacers jersey. For T.J. and the Pacers, it was a good night as Indiana stunned Oklahoma City with a 111-110 comeback win to take a 1-0 series lead in the Finals. T.J. McConnell is just the ninth player from the WPIAL or Pittsburgh's City League to play in the nearly 80 years of the NBA Finals.
Washington Post
an hour ago
- Washington Post
Inside the Comeback: How the Pacers pulled off a stunner in Game 1 of the NBA Finals
OKLAHOMA CITY — The game plan was the obvious one. Just chip away, the Indiana Pacers said, because there was no other option that would have made any sense at that point. They were down by 15 with 9:42 remaining. They were turning the ball over about once every three possessions, couldn't stop Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and had the Oklahoma City crowd in a deafening fury. 'We just said, 'Hey, let's just keep chipping away at the rock,'' Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. 'Got to keep pounding the rock and just chip away and hang in.' With 0.3 seconds left, there was no more rock left to pound. Not for Game 1, anyway. Tyrese Haliburton scored with that much time left and the Pacers stunned the Oklahoma City Thunder 111-110 in the opener of this year's NBA Finals on Thursday night. A look inside the comeback: The Pacers outscored the Thunder 32-16 in that final 9:42, with only six players getting used for those final minutes and all of them figuring into the scoring column. Obi Toppin took two shots. Both were 3-pointers. Both connected. Myles Turner and Andrew Nembhard each scored eight points to lead Indiana during the flurry. Aaron Nesmith led the Pacers with four rebounds in that stretch. And Haliburton provided the exclamation point with the jumper at the end. 'I've worked my entire life to get to this stage, so there's no holding back,' Turner said. The Thunder shot 4 for 16 in that closing stretch. Gilgeous-Alexander was 2 for 4; everyone else on the Thunder combined to shoot 2 for 12. The MVP had 10 points; everyone else on the Thunder combined for six. The reasons for all that? 'A little bit of everything,' Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. 'They made some plays. On some of those plays they made some shots. They got a couple that you wish you'd get back. We had bonus fouls, which were costly. Then offensively we didn't move the scoreboard as well as we could have. So you just add all that up and that's how you get that sort of comeback.' There was no choke sign from Haliburton, no celebratory dance, just a bunch of hugs with teammates and a big hug with his father John Haliburton in the hallway near the Pacers' locker room afterward. The Pacers, coach Rick Carlisle said, haven't engaged in a ton of raucous postgame victory laps during this playoff run. 'This is going to be a long journey and a lot going on,' Carlisle said. 'So, we're just going to have to keep our eye on the ball and keep focusing on one another.' Here were some of the key moments: — Carlisle subbed in five new players — Haliburton, Nembhard, Nesmith, Toppin and Turner — with 9:42 left and Indiana trailing 94-79. — Turner hits a 3-pointer with 7:47 left, cutting the lead to 96-88 and forcing an OKC time-out. — Toppin and Turner made 3-pointers on consecutive possessions (Turner keeping the second one alive with an offensive rebound) to get Indiana within 98-94 with 6:16 left. — Gilgeous-Alexander's two free throws with 2:52 left pushed the Thunder lead to 108-99. Nesmith and Nembhard connected on back-to-back 3s, and Indiana was within thee with 1:59 left. — The Pacers got a stop with 11 seconds left and didn't call time, having taken advantage of a challenge stoppage 11 seconds earlier to map out scenarios. The clock kept running and Haliburton hit the winner with 0.3 seconds left. 'I don't know what you say about it but I know that this group is a resilient group and we don't give up until it's 0.0 on the clock.' — Haliburton. ___ AP NBA:
