Charles Barkley is not impressed with Kendrick Perkins, JJ Redick, or anyone else discussing the NBA MVP race on ESPN.
He was on Altitude Sports Radio’s Moser, Lombardi and Kane on Tuesday morning and clearly was not eager to talk about the fight between Redick and Perkins.
“Hey man, I’m trying to work on my golf game and you bring me on the radio to talk about stupid stuff?” the Inside the NBA analyst said when asked how he felt about Perkins insinuating that race played a role in Nikola Jokic being the favorite to win the award for a third straight year.
Host Vic Lombardi asked Barkley if he saw the exchange. Barkley responded simply “I did not. I got a life.”
Lombardi then played audio of the exchange in which Perkins pointed out that 80% of voters for the MVP award are white. While Perkins never explicitly said that was the only reason Jokic had won awards in the past, it did seem to be the implication.
“Asinine, silly and stupid. Pick one of the words, whichever one you want,” Barkley said in response.
Barkley added that this is a pattern for ESPN. The network’s debates about the MVP award rarely matchup with the discussions voters are having or the evidence they are asked to consider.
“They do this silly debate every year about the MVP, going back to even when I played,” he said. “They did it a lot with LeBron, which makes me laugh, too. Derrick Rose won it. He deserved it. Kevin Durant won it. He deserved it. It’s a regular season award. It ain’t who the best player is. It’s who had the best regular season, but every year ESPN gets these fools on radio and TV to talk about who’s the best player.”
