After the rocky relationship between Skip Bayless and Shannon Sharpe was on full display this week, Charles Barkley couldn’t wait for his chance to mock them on Inside the NBA.
Monday night, Bayless insensitively wondered how the NFL could suspend the Bills–Bengals game after Buffalo safety Damar Hamlin suffered cardiac arrest and needed to have his heartbeat restored on the field. Amazingly, Hamlin has shown remarkable improvement in his long road to recovery and even began speaking Friday morning.
Skip’s poorly timed tweet appeared to cause his debate partner Shannon Sharpe to miss Tuesday’s episode of Undisputed on FS1. And when Sharpe returned to the show Wednesday morning, he was rudely interrupted by Bayless after requesting the controversial tweet to be removed. The discourse went viral as Bayless raged at the notion of needing to remove the tweet, doubling down on his message and blasting Sharpe for broaching the topic on their show.
Fireworks to start Undisputed over Skip's tweet pic.twitter.com/CnMBvgUPP3
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) January 4, 2023
Thursday night, notorious Bayless-hater Charles Barkley was champing at the bit to troll Skip and Shannon on Inside the NBA. After Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal, Ernie Johnson and Kenny Smith went on-air, it took Chuck less than two minutes to make his first reference to the feud.
Here's a compilation of Barkley trolling Skip Bayless last night on Inside the NBA pic.twitter.com/uRUR6laK8y
— Brandon Contes (@BrandonContes) January 6, 2023
“I’m sick of you man, I’m sick of you!” Barkley yelled at O’Neal with a smirk to start the show. “You interrupted Ernie already. First show of the year, you already interrupted him. Can he finish his monologue?”
Johnson was in the background imploring Barkley to “stop,” but the Basketball Hall-of-Famer and noted Skip Bayless-hater was just getting started.
After Barkley accidentally cursed on-air, he sheepishly apologized before deciding to echo Bayless’s double-down. “I’m not taking my tweet down,” Barkley yelled. “I’m not taking my tweet down! I believe what I said!”
Finally, near the end of the show, Barkley expressed how much he loves Shaq’s mom and complimented him for putting her in his commercials.
“She loves you too,” O’Neal said. “She loves you, I don’t.”
“Trust me,” Barkley responded. “Just like Shannon, I know what it’s like to work with somebody you hate.”
Barkley’s troll job came just a few weeks after he and O’Neal blatantly mocked Bayless and Sharpe for a recent blowup they had on Undisputed. But even that viral blowup failed to reach the shocking levels of their latest clash.
While the angst between Bayless and Sharpe appears to be somewhat new, Barkley and Bayless have been feuding for decades. Last year, Bayless claimed he fears the documented hate and threats directed at him by Barkley may eventually lead to his death. While there have been physical threats in the past, Barkley’s trolling of Bayless Thursday night was nothing more than a well-deserved ribbing.
