TNT analyst Charles Barkley called LeBron James "whiny," which set the Cleveland Cavaliers superstar off. In response to Barkley, James called the Hall of Famer a "hater," a sentiment echoed in kind by his good friend Dwyane Wade. Barkley though, is not phased in the least bit by what James said.
"I have no problem with what LeBron said," Barkley said on ESPN Chicago's Waddle & Silvy radio show on Tuesday. "Some of it was true. I did pay my debt, that's not true. I was never late to the All-Star Game, so that's not true. But I don't overreact, I'm not gonna say anything bad about him or get personal, I stick by what I said. He was all whiny and everything last week. If I'm going to be straightforward, like I always try to be, I know guys are going to come back at me sometimes. I'm good. He got personal but I'm never going to get personal on an NBA player. All of my criticisms or critiques are always just about basketball and I'm going to keep doing what I do."
Barkley criticized James on "Inside the NBA" after the Cavs superstar openly complained about the team lacking a play-maker off the bench. James wants Cavs owner Dan Gilbert to open his wallet even wider than he already has and get another play-maker on the team so Cleveland can truly be in the right place to defend their championship. Barkley didn't like how James was going through the media with his complaints, so he called James "whiny," which is why the Cavs star sounded off.
Yet despite what was said, Barkley is sticking to his original comments and is choosing not to get personal like James said.
"Clearly, [James] Googled me and found out some things," Barkley said. "I'm not going to get upset because somebody said something bad about me. I'm not like 12 years. My initial criticism was fair and I'm good with that."
Throughout the interview, Barkley kept sticking by his "whiny" comment and reiterated why called James that.
"Some of those things he said about [me] were correct, but that doesn't make my message incorrect," Barkley said. "I thought he was really whiny and complaining the last couple of weeks, talking about you got no help. And I'm just like, 'Dude you just won the championship, and it's the middle of the season and you're just bashing your teammates.' I think that that wasn't right."
He is often misguided but Barkley has a point here as he simply expressed his feelings about James' open questioning of his team's roster. Perhaps James was frustrated with the Cavs' recent struggles and needed to direct his frustrations toward Barkley. But no matter why James reacted the way he did, he was direct and quite personal in his criticisms of Barkley, which the Hall of Famer is refusing to do.
For Barkley, he always critiques the game purely from a basketball level and never factors in anyone's off-court transgressions or personal life. And as Barkley also reminded Waddle & Silvy that he has praised James in the past and has no problem with his game. It's James' comments about his teammates what still bothers Barkley.
"Any time you criticize these young guys, they call you a hater," Barkley said. "They never ask you if the criticism is fair or not. I've said the guy is one of the 10 greatest players ever. I've said the guy is the best player in the world. I've said he's a wonderful guy. I'm not sure how that constitutes hating just because he's bashing his teammates everyday."
Barkley isn't expecting James to retract his comments or anything like. In fact, Barkley kept saying he doesn't care what James said. For him, Barkley is going to keep being himself and as he put it, do his job.
"I've only met LeBron casually," Barkley said. "He's always been great to me. I think I've been great and cordial to him, but this notion that we have to be friends -- we're never gonna be friends. And that's not a negative thing. I'm not friends with none of these young guys. My job is to do my job."