Charles Barkley said on Wednesday that he is hoping fires him after his charles barkley cardi b comment during the NBA Finals. The NBA analyst turned the joke into a contract play, saying he would like to keep paying him for six or seven years if it does.
Barkley on Fox Sports Radio
“I'm hoping they fire me,” Barkley said on Fox Sports Radio on Wednesday. He added, “I got six or seven years left on my contract that they know I got no chance of doing.”
He was even more direct about the money. “I would love for them to fire me and have to pay me for the next six or seven years,” he said. Barkley also said, “I would love to get fired, I'm not gonna lie.”
Game 3 at Madison Square Garden
The remark traces back to Monday’s Game 3 of the NBA Finals at Madison Square Garden, when Barkley laughed on air during Cardi B’s halftime performance. He said, “I don't know if those are B's. They might be Cardi D's,” and then added, “I'm pretty sure those aren't B's. She's got the wrong initials.”
That joke landed in a broadcast setup unlike Barkley’s usual TNT desk. Inside the NBA is serving as the studio show before, during, and after the NBA Finals on ABC for the first time, while licenses the production without editorial control. has spent more than a decade trying to build a basketball studio show that could match Inside the NBA, cycling through Magic Johnson, Michael Wilbon, Stephen A. Smith, Bill Simmons and Jalen Rose, and also using Sage Steele, Michele Beadle, Maria Taylor, Malika Andrews and planning to elevate Rachel Nichols.
and Inside the NBA
Barkley’s Wednesday comments put that arrangement in plain view. appears on the Finals telecast, but Barkley does not actually work for, and the network is carrying an outside studio show it does not run the way it runs its own programming.
The friction sits in the contrast: Barkley can needle the network publicly, yet the contract he described would keep the money flowing for six or seven years if cuts him loose. For viewers, that means the Cardi B joke is no throwaway line; it is a live reminder that is borrowing the show while TNT keeps the leverage.
