Charles Barkley has been covering the NCAA tournament with Kenny Smith annually since 2011 when Turner Sports and CBS partnered up. Not surprisingly, he’s gotten under the skin of fans watching at home for making mistakes on more than one occasion.
Just don’t expect Barkley to care whatsoever that he isn’t beloved by all.
“I don’t worry about no criticisms,” he said, per Ben Strauss of the Washington Post. “You know what they should do? They should just kiss my a– and thank me for the billion dollars we pay for this tournament.”
That’s pretty much classic Barkley, whose blunt messages are one of the biggest reasons he’s so popular as an NBA analyst to begin with.
As it concerns his annual prep for the NCAA tournament, Barkley admitted it’s a bit overwhelming, while also admitting he had others do his homework for him at college.
“The toughest thing is you have to watch so many games and you get so many different reports on different players,” Barkley said. “It’s kind of like homework, except now I have to do my own homework. When I was in college, they did it for me.”
The NCAA tournament will be a blast, and you can bet Barkley will stir up some controversy while on air. That’s pretty much part of his job, after all.