Charles Barkley forever insisted he was going to retire at 60 and leave the television world, but instead, the now 60-year-old keeps adding jobs to his resumé.
After re-signing on a massive deal to continue with Inside the NBA, Barkley also is headed to CNN for a weekly talk show with Gayle King in the fall. He also makes appearances on NBA TV during the Finals, and most recently popped up on TNT’s Stanley Cup Finals coverage from Miami. During that appearance, he got told by Wayne Gretzky that he doesn’t need to go do news and should instead join them each week for their hockey show, because he wouldn’t even have to leave Atlanta.
Barkley responded that Gretzky is far from the first person he knows to try and talk him out of doing the CNN show, joking “apparently I’m jumping on the Titanic,” with how many people are telling him “abort, abort” [3:25 of the below video].
A man that needs no introduction… Charles Barkley has joined the @NHL_On_TNT desk and it is GOLD
pic.twitter.com/sduvrWneD8
— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) June 10, 2023
As Awful Announcing explained, part of the reason many are likely trying to talk Chuck out of doing the talk show is CNN is going through some structural changes, most notably with Chris Licht being let go as CEO after being the one to come up with the Barkley-King show. Still, Barkley is defiant about continuing on, saying he’s “excited” about working with Gayle. We’ll see in a few months whether Barkley’s friends were right about him needing to avoid jumping on with CNN, or if he can make the transition to the news world and find success the way he has in sports television.