I May Be Wrong But I Doubt It - Charles Barkley [48]
We spend so much time concentrating on junk when there are admirable people involved in sports, really nice people who make significant contributions. Three of the nicest people I’ve ever met in my life are Emmitt Smith, Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux. Carl Lewis is great. You know who I’m really impressed with? Mike Krzyzewski. When he was on the Olympic coaching staff, I spent a lot of time picking his brain. I made a conscious decision to sit down and talk with him every day, and I’m just really impressed with him. And as I’ve said, the guys who were the most influential in my life were Julius Erving and Moses Malone. I can’t tell you how important it was to have them as mentors when I was young and just coming into the league.
One thing we all share—and some guys deal with this better than others—is that no matter how hard you work at your craft and no matter how successful you become, people just have to find something negative to hang on you. You can be the greatest ever at what you do, and people will still turn on you. Even with all the championships Michael Jordan has won, people say, “Well, he’s a great basketball player but he’s not socially conscious.” Now we’re hearing the same thing about Tiger. Phil Mickelson has to hear that he hasn’t won any majors, then when he wins a couple it’ll be that he should have won more. The bar is always being raised as you go. The rules are always being rewritten.
There’s aggravation that comes with that, but that’s part of what makes triumph so sweet.
Television and Hollywood
Rudy Martzke, the sports television critic for USA Today, tried to start something one night down on the set at Turner in Atlanta. He said, “Charles, you didn’t win an Emmy.” I told him I didn’t care about stuff like that, and I meant it. I couldn’t be happier that Ernie Johnson won an Emmy. And I’m really glad our show won an Emmy. I’m not stupid. If the show never won an Emmy before now, and they add me to the mix and we won an Emmy, I helped contribute to an Emmy-winning show. I had something to do with it, and that’s enough.
We do have great chemistry, and we have a good time while trying to give some insight as to what happened or what people should look for in a game, or around the league, or in the next couple of weeks. I think Kenny disagrees with me sometimes just to disagree, but I really, really like Kenny. And I love Ernie. The guy is a real professional and he and Kenny make it very comfortable for guests to sit on the set and participate in discussions on live TV, which can scare some guys. And in my case, I think it works because Turner allows me to have fun with it, and for us to have fun with each other.
People wonder why I went with Turner and not NBC. But I studied both shows, and I just didn’t think NBC was going to let me have fun the way I wanted to have fun. I know that a network like NBC has a certain way it wants to treat the product, and I understand that. But to me, the product is entertainment, and if you don’t entertain people it’s not going to work. The powers-that-be in sports made it a business, and that business is entertainment. Only one team wins the championship. Some teams have no chance to contend for the championship at all, but they better entertain people for an entire season, make ’em happy and keep ’em wanting to come to the games, or at least watch the games on TV, or they’re going out of business.
What I like is trying to find a way to be entertaining, but also tackle some tough issues. I hate when television doesn’t want to tackle tough issues, but just make all the money and avoid getting real out of fear. To me, that’s a disservice. I guess the secret is finding a way to entertain and make people comfortable enough so that they’ll stay tuned in when you do take a stand on real issues. I’m not saying it’s easy or that we should do it all the time, but damn, don’t you have