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If the 2024-25 NBA season proves to be the league’s final run with 40-year partner TNT, Charles Barkley may try to smuggle out the network’s celebrated studio show under his 62L suit jacket.
In a Thursday morning appearance on The Dan Patrick Show, the Inside the NBA mainstay said he’s spoken with his castmates Ernie Johnson, Kenny Smith and Shaquille O’Neal about what their next move should be if Comcast’s NBC Sports unit unseats TNT for the rights to the league’s “B” package.
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“I’ve talked to the guys about everybody signing with my production company … and I would love to do that if we lose it,” Barkley said, just two days after having won his fifth Sports Emmy Award for his work on Inside the NBA. As Barkley reiterated earlier this month on ESPN Radio, his 10-year, $100 million contract with TNT includes an opt-out clause, one that would allow him to walk away from Warner Bros. Discovery in the event the company fumbles the NBA bag.
While it’s unclear if the other three Inside the NBA fixtures have similar agreements in place, Barkley has suggested that 34-year TNT veteran Johnson is unlikely to jump ship. (Should Johnson stay the course in a post-NBA future, he’d still get plenty of reps in as TNT Sports’ March Madness studio anchor.) Worth noting: Barkley and the chairman of NBCUniversal Media Group, Mark Lazarus, worked together from 1999-2008, a span that includes Lazarus’ four-year stint as president of Turner Sports.
If there is much to be sorted out before fans can start entertaining visions of a wholly uncensored Sir Charles blazing through a final season behind the desk—Comcast has yet to submit a formal proposal, although its offer of $2.6 billion+ per season will be tough for WBD to match—Barkley offered a sneak preview of sorts today when he dunked on his corporate overlords.
“We’re just sitting back waiting on these people to figure out what they’re going to do,” Barkley said. “You know, my two favorite wines are Inglenook and Opus, and these clowns I work for, they’ve turned us into Ripple and Boone’s Farm and Thunderbird….
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/charles-barkley-dunks-wbd-brass-175532588.html
Author : Sportico
Publish date : 2024-05-23 17:55:32
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