NBA greats Charles Barkley and Michael Jordan have not spoken to each other in more than a decade after a heated phone call over comments Barkley, 62, made on TV.
Barkley told the "Tom Tolbert Show" that their 2012 argument was over criticism he leveled at Jordan, 62, as owner of the Charlotte Hornets, then known as the Charlotte Bobcats.
"He called me that night and went ballistic on me," Barkley said on the Sunday, December 21 episode. "He said ‘You supposed to be my best friend and you're going to do that bulls***?'"
"I told him I have to do my job and you haven't been a good GM," Barkley replied. "How can I criticize other people and give him a pass? When other guys make bad draft picks, I call them on it too."
Barkley's comments, which came on TNT's Inside the NBA, were about what Barkley deemed was the necessity for Jordan to surround himself with people who will tell him the truth, rather than "yes men."
Their phone call was decidedly one-sided, according to Barkley.
"He just cursed me out up and down," he said. "And we have not spoken since that night. It's a very difficult thing for me because he was my best friend at the time."
The Round Mound of Rebound has spoken about that phone call before, revealing to the "All the Smoke" podcast in 2023 the last thing Jordan said to him.
"The last thing I heard was ‘Motherf*****, f*** you, you're supposed to be my boy," he said at the time.
Despite 13 years of not speaking, Barkley has maintained that he is open to patching things up with His Airness.
"That's on his end. He was my best friend at the time, and I love the guy and I miss the guy,' he told Bleacher Report in 2023. "I thought it would blow over, to be honest with you. And he's stubborn - and I'm stubborn - and that's it."
Jordan became a minority owner of the Hornets in 2006 before claiming majority status in 2010, making him the league's only African-American majority owner. He then sold his majority stake in 2023 for around $3 billion, which is more than 10 times what he initially paid. Jordan is now again a minority owner.
The Hornets have made only three playoff appearances under Jordan's ownership and have not won a playoff series in that time. The 2025-26 Hornets are also struggling, coming into play on Monday, December 22 with a 9-19 record, good for 12th in the 15-team Eastern Conference.
Despite the team's shortcomings, Jordan has been able to use his status as arguably the greatest player who ever lived to recruit talent to Charlotte. Four-time NBA champion Tony Parker recalled the Hornets trying to recruit him at the end of his career in 2018, telling hornets.com, "When MJ called, it was over."
"He texted me, and everybody that's known me for many years knows M.J. was always my idol growing up," continued Parker, 43. "He was my favorite player and that's who I wanted to become. He made me want to play basketball."
US Weekly