Barkley Leaves His Teams All Choked Up

Well, another of Charles Barkley’s basketball teams has been defeated. This comes as absolutely no surprise, because if there is any basketball team in the land that you can count on to be defeated, it is Charles Barkley’s.

Charles Barkley receives more praise for not winning than anyone alive, except maybe Marcia Clark.

Funny how his teams never seem to win championships, on any level. Barkley’s collegiate teams won nothing. His pro teams have won nothing. Patrick Ewing was triumphant in his school days, at least. Shaquille O’Neal hasn’t won much, but he is 10 years younger than Barkley. No, very few superstars lose as consistently as the Chuckster loses. This guy can lose with the worst of ‘em.

He can also lose with the best. Give him great teammates, and Barkley can turn them into losers, almost overnight. Interesting how when you put two “Dream Team” players together, adding Clyde Drexler to Hakeem Olajuwon, the Houston Rockets win an NBA championship. Yet, as soon as you add Charles Barkley, a third Dream Teamer, to a team that still has Drexler and Olajuwon, then suddenly this team cannot even advance past the NBA semifinals.

So, go ahead, insult Dennis Rodman all you like. The fact remains that not one but two of that tattooed numskull’s teams--Detroit and Chicago--have won championships with Dennis as a teammate. Dennis doesn’t talk to his teammates; he just wins with them.

But when they vote for the “50 Greatest NBA Players of All Time,” which player gets to be among the 50? Why, it’s the chokester, good old Charles Barkley, whose championship banners hang only from the rafters of his mind.

I don’t know how much more evidence the American public needs to realize what a complete and utter loser Charles Barkley is. This man has spat at fans, has punched patrons of bars, has publicly requested not to be considered a role model (no problem), has deliberately attempted to injure opponents, both in the Olympics (some poor guy from Angola) and in the NBA (John Stockton, just the other day), and makes racially insensitive remarks that, spoken by someone else, would have resulted in a public outrage.

Yet in spite of this, people call him “Sir Charles.” I have seldom seen an athlete so undeserving of a nickname.

And no matter his flaws, no matter his failings, corporations and advertising execs continue to stand in line to land Charles Barkley as a client, to sell their products, on the sheer force of his statistics and his (ha, ha) winning personality. Oh, by all means, buy your child a pair of shoes worn by this athlete, so perhaps your son or daughter can grow up to be a player with great statistics and a big mouth, just like Chuck.

It takes more to make a great basketball player than a high scoring and rebounding average. Hundreds of guys have had those. Charles Barkley often makes fun of the L.A. Clippers, but they have won just as many NBA championships as he has. (And I like their chances better in the future.) He has played for Philadelphia, for Phoenix and for Houston, making him an equal-opportunity loser. You’ll notice that some superstars stay with one team, for their entire careers. But not the Chuckster. He spreads from town to town, like a virus.

I look forward to another NBA finals without him. I would rather see Michael Jordan or Karl Malone win a title any day of the week than see Charles Barkley go for one, probably by elbowing a Stockton or a Steve Kerr in the face when neither one was looking. I am happy that Hakeem and Clyde already have their diamond rings, so that the Chuckster couldn’t spoil their only chance.

The city of Phoenix once got sore at me, because I wrote that Phoenix would not win the NBA championship that year, because Phoenix never wins the NBA championship. Well, Phoenix still hasn’t won the NBA championship, but those Phoenix chickens were too yellow to ever admit I was right. I wonder if they know that the real reason I knew Phoenix wouldn’t win was that Charles Barkley’s team couldn’t beat Michael Jordan’s team if Jordan’s teammates were Daffy Duck and Porky Pig.

Houston had no excuse for losing its series with Utah last week. Olajuwon, Drexler and Barkley were all out there, together, three Dreamers, healthy, wealthy and wise. Matt Maloney was hot and Eddie Johnson was hotter, but still, how many games did Houston win out of six? Two.

In their final game, on the Rockets’ home floor, Barkley made five baskets in 39 minutes. Another big night for Mister Clutch. Oh, and that was also Chuck who tanked those two free throws in the final seconds of a Seattle playoff game, which the SuperSonics won in overtime, which extended the Rocket-SuperSonic series and made Houston’s team even more exhausted for its series with the well-rested Jazz.

My only sadness in seeing Houston get eliminated is that I had been looking forward to Barkley and Rodman head-butting one another.

I suppose that Charles Barkley could jump to the Bulls next season, to shoot one more time for a championship. Just think, if he had Jordan, Rodman, Scottie Pippen, Ron Harper and Toni Kukoc as teammates, Barkley would probably have a great season . . . at least until the Bulls got eliminated from the playoffs, possibly in the first round.