Charles Barkley has had plenty to say about both ESPN as a network and its NBA personalities. But when it comes to his beef with ESPN NBA analyst Kendrick Perkins, their animosity for one another appears to be water under the bridge.
Barkley and Perkins have exchanged multiple shots over the 2024-25 NBA season and beyond. Perhaps most notably, Barkley called Perkins an “idiot” for his coverage of the Lakers’ acquisition of Luka Dončić, prompting Perkins to call Barkley a “senior citizen” and to “keep that same energy” the next time they met face to face.
With the impending move of Inside the NBA to ESPN programming next season, Perkins discussed his future colleague on Monday’s episode of The Stephen A. Smith Show. And surprisingly, he had an unforeseen update for Smith, informing him and viewers watching the show that he and Barkley had “squashed” their beef.
“Let me say this to you, SA, real quick,” Perkins said to Smith. “I haven’t told anybody this, not even you. I want the world to know that me and the great Charles Barkley have no beef no more. We actually talked. I am sitting up here thinking. You know how my wife can be, she be on my a*s about stuff. She was like ‘Have you ever thought what are you and Barkley taking shots at each other for? Why are y’all beefing?’ She said it’s just stupid. So I reached out to our legend, our colleague, our good brother, Michael Wilbon. And I said, ‘Hey, Wilbon, can you reach out to Barkley and tell him to call me? I just think this is stupid.’
“He put us in a group message, and he wrote this whole paragraph and said, ‘Both of y’all are great friends of mine. Two of my most favorite people on the planet. I am making this introduction, maybe we can sit down and break bread, eat, and go to dinner in Chicago.’ So I responded, ‘Appreciate it, big bro. Charles, what’s up, legend? I would love to sit down with you and break bread.’ And he responded, ‘Big Perk, listen, you are doing an outstanding job. We shouldn’t be throwing shots at each other. In the NBA Finals, let’s link up and break bread.’ So we squashed that beef, that little beef that we had.”
Stephen A. Smith was overjoyed to hear this from Perkins, praising both Perkins and Barkley for getting over any bad blood they had and Michael Wilbon for acting as the “godfather” in the basketball media space.
“First of all, you did the wisest thing because that’s why we call Wilbon the godfather,” said Smith. “There is nobody better at bringing people together than Wilbon. If I ever run for office, he will be my Secretary of State. That brother, that’s just who he is. Secondly, I have been telling you for the last couple of years, (Charles) Barkley is a good dude, man. Barkley is gonna say what he feels. But most of the time, it is all in fun. He calls me a fool at least once a month. But we have got nothing but love for him. And by the way, we’re looking forward to the TNT crew coming to ESPN.”
Barkley has already explained that he doesn’t plan to participate in ESPN programming outside of Inside the NBA, which Turner will still produce. So, unless Perkins ends up on Inside the NBA, it’s unlikely they’ll spend much time together.
While it’s nice to see Perkins patch things up with one Inside the NBA analyst, he still has to work out his differences with Shaquille O’Neal, as they have also exchanged some back-and-forth criticisms in recent years.