By way of Awful Announcing comes this charming clip the first quarter of Thursday’s Miami Heat vs Atlanta Hawks game wherein Kevin Harlan, Reggie Miller and Sir Charles Five Buck Box It Rocks It Rocks Barkley discussing Weight Watchers, Dwight Howard and how sad the Hawks are while accidentally mic’d and on-air.

I think we can all agree that sports play-by-play would be at least 100 times better if announcers could say what needs to be said, such as:

Barkley: “Man I can’t stand to watch this Atlanta Hawks team play.”

Harlan: “This game is terrible.”

Barkley: “It is.”

Harlan: “Look at this game, 31 percent, God almighty.”

…and could start low-fat beef with Sara Rue over the ethical implications of getting paid thousands of dollars to lose two pounds a week:

“I thought this was the greatest scam going, getting paid to watch sports… this Weight Watchers thing is a bigger scam.”

That’s a fun sentence to take out of context. Barkley is being affable and saying, “hey, this is so easy I’m getting paid to do basically nothing”, but it can just as easily be blockquoted to mean “these jerks at Weight Watchers are stealing your money, just have some self control, your digestive system is not FourSquare why do you need points”. Yeah, I can only make this so controversial, but the clip is fun, and if announcing was more like this I’d listen to everything they had to say and not just tune out until the NO REGARD FOR HUMAN LIFE-type stuff started.

I think the true highlight of the clip is Barkley’s “I DON’T GIVE A F**K WHAT DWIGHT HOWARD WANTS” face in response to Reggie.

(p.s. Sorry Sara Rue, I’m glad your jeans fit now but you looked better before.)

On last night’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live”, L.A. Clipper Blake Griffin joined LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Charles Barkley on the shortlist of NBA stars who’ve been humiliated at the Chuck E. Cheese’s version of basketball by Ricardo, a Los Angeles busboy who happens to be fantastic at Pop-a-Shot. To make it fair, Ricardo shot blindfolded, and even that wasn’t enough to stop him from sinking a last minute basket and going ahead of Griffin 57-60 in the closing moments. Griffin responded by sulking away and spending the rest of his tokens on Revolution X.

I think this is a great way to use our sports celebrities, especially when they play for the Clippers and don’t have anything to do for the last two months of the season. I’m throwing out a challenge right here, right now: Al-Farouq Aminu, I think I can kick your ass at Whack-a-Mole, and I’m willing to prove it on any late night network television show. Oh man, George Lopez is going to lose his f-ing mind when he sees how many moles I’ve whacked. You’re mine, Al-Farouq Aminu!

[via television]

I suppose if half of your league’s teams are losing ridiculous amounts of money, and things are even so bad that the league had to assume control of one franchise, considerable power could be transferred to the people who are still giving you a ton of cash. To be less vague, Nike and LeBron James run the NBA, not David Stern. At least that’s what TNT commentator and NBA Hall-of-Famer Charles Barkley told the Miami Herald about why he has seemingly gone quiet on his concerns with the Miami Heat, as opposed to his earlier candidness.

“I don’t know if Dwyane’s upset with me, but I don’t sit around and worry about it.” He said LeBron James hasn’t said anything to him. “These athletes today are all wussified,” Barkley said. “I’ve been saying LeBron’s been the best player in the league for three years. And I say one thing criticizing The Decision, and I get a phone call from Nike saying why don’t I like LeBron? It’s interesting how this [expletive] works. These groups today, if you don’t say 100 percent positive about their guy or their team, they overreact.”

True or not, this is why people hate LeBron James, in case Dan LeBatard wants to stop complaining about the haters for a second and be realistic. Most people are over the Decision for the most part (with the exception of Barkley if you read the rest of that interview) but it’s crap like this and confiscating video of Jordan Crawford dunking over James that make people think he’s a spoiled brat diva. Nike has every right to protect its iconic global brand, so long as the brand, his handlers, his leeches, his teammates, and his media ass-kissers understand that this protection revokes their right to care that we think James is a little girl. Well, a little girl who is amazing at basketball.

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Well, not in so many words, but of all the people in our God forsaken world to speak on the current wave of former and current NBA players and executives coming out as gay adults, it is Charles Barkley who speaks most rationally. Those May 21 apocalypse people might be on to something.

Barkley told Washington Post columnist Mike Wise that he’s sure he’s played with gay teammates, that “every player has played with gay guys,” and that anyone who claims to have never played with a gay teammate is a “stone-freakin’ idiot.” He added that he’s never worried about being hit on by a gay teammate or thought a gay player would affect his team, although he did urge all open and closeted homosexual men to try Taco Bell’s Five Buck Box, which Barkley says “rocks.”

The NBA Legend urged all homophobes to Shut Up and Jam:

“Man, we need to outlaw guys who suck at sports. … I’d rather have a gay guy who can play than a straight guy who can’t play.”

Sir Charles Barkley is an eleven-time NBA All-Star and a member of the original Dream Team, but he was never really a fitness role model. He’s also 48 years old and spent the last half a decade rocking the Five Buck Box, so react with only mild surprise when you see him looking turrble in his first week of CrossFit. I’d struggle with it too, especially if Ludacris was screaming GET BACK MOTHERF**KER at me while I cleaned and jerked. Maybe I just don’t have what it takes to be a member of Team COCKDIESEL.

Our own Matt Ufford is a CrossFit veteran, so I asked him what he thought of the video. His two cents:

I almost feel bad making fun of Barkley — this was apparently filmed during his first week of CrossFit, a time when a lot of the exercises are unfamiliar and uncomfortable (note: I’m endlessly thankful and relieved that my first week of CrossFit wasn’t filmed). Check out his cleans compared to everyone else’s: he doesn’t have the wrist flexibility to rest the bar on his shoulders.

We can laugh now, but if Sir Charles sticks with it, he’s going to look a hell of a lot better in six months.

Now to find that hilarious video of Detlef Schrempf doing P90X.

Last week, Tucker Carlson’s spinning bowtie propelled him back into the news after he said that Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Michael Vick should have been executed for his role in a dog fighting ring. For some reason, Charles Barkley took a moment during last Thursday’s game between the Dallas Mavericks and Oklahoma City Thunder to address Carlson’s comments in a way that only Chuck can.

Said Barkley:

“Now Tucker Carlson, who’s a nobody … he used to work for us over here. We fired him because he sucked. Now he goes over there and he says that Michael Vick should be executed, which is total BS. You know, TV is a very powerful thing and you can’t just go on there and say anything.”

Carlson apologized shortly after his comment became a big deal, but Charles didn’t know that and he elected to rant instead. And really, his rants make the world a better place. Like, I loved his rant in 2008 about how the Auburn Tigers shouldn’t have hired Gene Chizik. Hmmmm, what did he say again…

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