Charles Barkley is one of the biggest characters the NBA has ever seen. He’s always up to something, usually joking around or causing controversy.
Barkley is the main attraction when it comes to watching TNTs Inside the NBA. You know Barkley is going to say something wild or even do something crazy while explaining the game of basketball.
Of course, anyone who has followed Barkley’s playing career will tell you this is no act for television. Barkley has done extreme things during his playing career. On the court, Barkley went to extreme measures, in a good way, to get a rebound as he battled players much taller than him.
Off the court, these extreme things sometimes led to the law getting involved. The perfect example of this would be when Barkley threw a man through a window in a bar. This is certainly a situation of Barkley taking things to the next level, but did you know Barkley performed an extreme act involving his diet in order to not get drafted by the Philadelphia 76ers in 1984?
Barkley’s Eating Binge To Avoid The 76ers
In 1984, as the teams were figuring out which players to select in the draft, the Philadelphia 76ers had their eyes on Charles Barkley. The 76ers let Barkley know they wanted to draft him, and Barkley was excited about this.
The 76ers had one stipulation for Barkley, though. After graduating college, Barkley weighed 300 pounds. The 76ers wanted him to lose weight and get down to 283 pounds.
Barkley had one month to lose the weight, and he did. The night before the draft, Barkley met with the 76ers, weighing only 283 pounds. But what the 76ers told Barkley changed his mind about wanting to play for them.
“So I get down to 283,” Barkley said in an interview with Sports Illustrated. “And the night before we fly into Philly, my agent said, ‘You do know if the Sixers draft you they are going to give you $75,000, right?’ I said, ‘Dude, I didn’t leave college for $75,000. We have a problem.’ He said, ‘You weigh about 283 now. What do you want to do? You beat their weight limit.’ I said, ‘Let’s go out.'”
Barkley went on to explain how he’d go about gaining the weight, so the 76ers would pass on him.
“We went to Denny’s, and I had like two Grand Slam breakfasts. We went to lunch, and I had like two big barbecue sandwiches. That night we went to a big steakhouse. The next morning I had two more Grand Slam breakfasts, and when we flew to Philly, I weighed 302. I was like. ‘Thank goodness the Sixers are not going to draft me.’
“So when you look at my face when commissioner (David) Stern says, ‘With the fifth pick in the draft, the Philadelphia 76ers select Charles Barkley,’ I was like, ‘Oh, s***.’”
It is remarkable (and unhealthy) that Barkley was able to gain nearly 20 pounds in 48 hours. Of course, since the 76ers ended up selecting him anyway, you could say it was all for nothing.
If you ask Barkley, though, he’d actually probably disagree. For him, to have the chance to binge on all that delicious food had to be a win for him.
Barkley would go on to play eight seasons for the Philadelphia 76ers, and he averaged 23.3 points and 11.6 rebounds per game. In Philadelphia, Barkley established himself as one of the game’s best players.
Even though Barkley never won an NBA championship in Philadelphia or anywhere else in his career, it doesn’t take away the fact he’s one of the game’s greatest players. It also doesn’t take away from the fact Barkley is one of the funniest and most beloved players/analysts the game of basketball has ever seen.
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