Come play “Name That Mascot” with Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith!
During the first weekend of March Madness coverage, TNT’s Ernie Johnson and CBS Sports’ Clark Kellogg decided to test their fellow basketball analysts Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith in a mascot trivia game.
In a spirited round of “Name That Mascot,” Barkley and Smith had to try and guess who the mascots were as they were held up, and the results were expectedly hysterical.
We’re not really sure who “won” this game, but we felt like winners as Barkley and Smith riffed with each other about their answers and the mascots at hand.
All in all, this was a very fun break from all of Saturday’s basketball action, which you can also enjoy below.
Ernie Johnson and Clark Kellogg tested Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith's knowledge of NCAA Tournament team's mascots.
Charles Barkley couldn’t help getting a few digs in at his co-host during March Madness
Charles Barkley doesn’t need to do a ton of research when it comes to picking his favorite teams each year in the men’s NCAA tournament.
If his Auburn Tigers are in the big dance, he’ll ride with his alma mater. And if the Tigers get knocked out — like they did on Friday in a massive Yale upset — he’ll just root for which ever teams are playing against the favorite teams of his NBA on TNT co-hosts.
With No. 1 North Carolina facing No. 9 Michigan State on Saturday, Barkley was asked about joining the Tom Izzo bandwagon and gave a very succinct and sarcastic answer.
“I want Izzo to win because I hate Kenny [Smith].” Barkley joked.
Charles Barkley at halftime of the North Carolina-Michigan State game:
"You can see [the Tar Heels are] a better team, and I think it's gonna end up getting out of hand."
Knowing you’ve just gotten under Barkley’s skin must still be so satisfying after all these years. Especially when Charles has certainly had worse reasons for picking teams in March.
“We’ll show the whole ceremony when the Celtics retire your jersey.”
The NBA on TNT broadcasters are some of the best in the business. Shaq, Kenny, Ernie, and Charles make analyzing basketball fun because regularly roast each other during broadcasts. But behind-the-scenes footage from NBA All-Star weekend suggests that their jokes aren’t just for TV. In what can only be described as a likely version of their group chat, the crew gives Shaq zinger after zinger over complaints he seemingly had about his Orlando Magic jersey retirement ceremony not being shown on TNT.
NBA All-Star Weekend was filled with a lot of wild moments, including LeBron James claiming he knew nothing about the Warriors’ alleged attempt to trade for him, Kenny Smith’s WNBA 3-point line comments about Sabrina Ionescu and whatever awful display of defense was played during the All-Star game. But, nothing could have prepared us for this.
In new behind-the-scenes footage, Shaquille O’Neal appears slightly bothered that his Orlando Magic jersey retirement ceremony was shown on NBA TV and not TNT. You get the sense that he was genuinely pumped about his jersey retirement and wanted his friends to acknowledge it. However, they’re like, “Nah, no big deal. We got games to show.”
That’s when Charles Barkley starts clowning Shaq, saying the ceremony should have been on truTV. And, it all goes downhill from there.
Kenny Smith says he was advocating for Sabrina Ionescu, but nobody is entitled to believe him.
Kenny Smith’s All-Star Weekend comments on Sabrina Ionescu have the internet buzzing, but he’s not backing down. He recently told Stephen A. Smith that he was advocating for Sabrina when he suggested she should have shot from the WNBA line against Stephen Curry.
The first-ever NBA vs. WNBA 3-point contest was nearly soured by comments made by TNT analyst Kenny Smith. Kenny surmised that Sabrina Ionescu should have shot from the WNBA line against Stephen Curry to make things “fair.” He also compared the contest to why gender-specific tees are used in golf.
Basketball fans immediately roasted him, but Kenny argued that he was advocating for Sabrina during a recent appearance on the Stephen A. Smith show. (See the clip below and the 23:03 mark of the YouTube video.)
Kenny Smith on criticism of his Sabrina Ionescu comments:
"Much ado about nothing honestly. Most people who know basketball understood…I was advocating for her more than anything else… … "My…track record speaks for itself"
“I think it’s much ado about nothing, Stephen. Most people who know basketball understood what I was talking about. Actually, I was advocating for her more than anything else.“
Kenny tells Stephen A. that basketball is muscle memory and that if you are not shooting from where you practice, it will mess with your accuracy. He admits that both players could have made other adjustments but re-emphasizes that muscle memory is at one line.
What stands out most about his new comments is that Kenny quips, “Most people just don’t check the tape. They want just to check the bait.” (24:56 mark of the above video) The irony is that if he had bothered to check the tape on Sabrina, he would have known she didn’t shoot from the WNBA line. When she tweeted that she would shoot from the NBA line, it was because that was already her normal range.
For example, during an August 2023 game, Sabrina made six three-pointers well beyond the WNBA line. At the 1:14 mark of the video below, the broadcast can be heard saying, “Look at how deep she is, and that is normal range for her.” She likely couldn’t shoot as many 3-pointers as Steph Curry during the contest because she isn’t shooting that kind of high volume regularly (over 15 consecutive shots), not because she isn’t capable.
Sabrina earned the same amount of points during her shootout with Steph as Damian Lillard, Karl-Anthony Towns, Trae Young, and Tyrese Haliburton did from the same NBA line. How quickly people forget that Sabrina owns the 3-point contest record for both the WNBA and NBA. Steph Curry does not hold that record despite being the greatest shooter ever. So, Sabrina almost taking down the metaphorical Thanos of basketball on her first try should speak volumes about her abilities.
Kenny Smith has spent the past 26 years working with Turner Sports and TNT’s NBA coverage in some capacity. And as a co-analyst on TNT’s Inside the NBA, fans expect Smith to have expert familiarity with today’s NBA. After all, that’s what he gets paid to talk about on TV.
Saturday, though, was not Smith’s best effort. He told on himself all night and even had Reggie Miller utterly perplexed with some of the remarks he made.
Smith drew harsh criticism for his comments about Sabrina Ionescu using the NBA three-point line in her showdown with Steph Curry. But during the regular three-point contest, Smith was admittedly surprised that the Pacers’ Tyrese Haliburton could shoot threes at such a high frequency.
Kenny Smith: “I didn’t know, Reg, that [Haliburton] could shoot the ball with this frequency.”
It was such an odd remark for an NBA analyst to make on national TV that Miller responded with, “Do you watch the games?”
Miller had a point. It’s not like Haliburton suddenly started shooting a high percentage this year. He’s a career 40-percent three-point shooter, and he’s been taking six threes per game throughout his entire career (and nearly eight this season). He shoots threes a lot and shoots them well. Smith should have known that one of the game’s best three-point shooters could, well, shoot.
Fans were also not impressed with Smith’s performance on the night, and they were glad that Miller called him out.
Sue Bird thinks the NBA screwed up with its announcers for Sabrina Ionescu and Steph Curry.
Steph Curry and Sabrina Ionescu’s iconic three-point contest should’ve been a fantastic celebration of basketball. Two of the best shooters in the world, in two different leagues, meeting up for a fun shootout from deep in Indianapolis? What more could you ask for?
A thoughtful woman’s announcer next to Reggie Miller and Kevin Harlan might have been a great start. That’s according to Sue Bird.
Instead of gushing about the contrasting styles and dynamic energy Curry and Ionescu bring to the court, Kenny Smith was rightfully pilloried for suggesting Ionescu should’ve shot behind the women’s standard three-point line even though she only lost by three. Also, her final score of 26 was equal to Damian Lillard’s winning total during the other three-point contest.
Surely not a coincidence, Bird appreciated the final results of Curry and Ionescu’s duel but lamented that there wasn’t a woman’s voice offering a nuanced perspective:
We needed a woman on the headsets, too. So much nuance & storytelling missed.
The league should learn a valuable lesson from this moment since this probably won’t be the only time an NBA and WNBA star square off in an All-Star Weekend event. Have an insightful booth featuring both perspectives, and everyone can just zero in on the fun.
The one-on-one three-point contest between Stephen Curry and Sabrina Ionescu was a highlight of the All-Star Saturday in Indianapolis. NBA fans were upset by TNT’s Kenny Smith’s remarks. He argued with Reggie Miller, saying Ionescu didn’t shoot from …
The one-on-one three-point contest between Stephen Curry and Sabrina Ionescu was a highlight of the All-Star Saturday in Indianapolis. NBA fans were upset by TNT’s Kenny Smith‘s remarks. He argued with Reggie Miller, saying Ionescu didn’t shoot from the WNBA line and that it wasn’t fair she used a smaller ball.
Here’s how NBA Twitter and even Joel Embiid reacted to Smith’s comments.
Curry managed to narrowly defeat Ionescu, who was shooting from NBA range during the competition a Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. It was a competitive battle between two of the greatest shooters in the sport and it was thrilling to watch for the fans.
That is why it was especially disappointing when TNT’s Kenny Smith suggested that Ionescu should have shot the ball from the WNBA 3-point line.
Kenny Smith wanted Sabrina Ionescu y To shoot from the women’s 3-point line and Reggie Miller wasn’t having it pic.twitter.com/s64X1VOOxh
Kenny Smith and Reggie Miller did their best to make the Stephen vs Sabrina showdown brutally awkward and ended it by arguing about playing with dolls for some reason. pic.twitter.com/ylysmUQ4y4
Ionescu performed extraordinarily well, she just had the impossible task of going against Curry. Few people on the planet could have made it even half as competitive as she did.
So naturally, hoops fans roasted Smith for his immediate commentary about the shooting distance in the competition.
The hosts of Inside the NBA had enough of Barkley, who complained that water (his Diet Coke substitute) doesn’t taste like anything.
Shaquille O’Neal made his way over to Barkley’s side of the desk and raided his Diet Coke supply. He found Barkley’s stash and began opening them up, drinking them and handing them to Kenny Smith and Ernie Johnson.
Barkley wanted to know if his co-hosts at least felt his pain as they sipped on the soda and he then told the viewers to his their enemies close to them.
We will see how long Barkley can stick to this resolution of no Diet Coke!
It’s genuinely impossible to predict whatever shenanigans that the Inside the NBA crew will get into whenever they’re all together.
On Tuesday night, Charles Barkley ramped his prankster spirit up a notch by revealing to all the viewers at home what hotel room fellow broadcaster Kenny Smith was staying in for that evening.
Smith had his hotel room key on the broadcasters’ table, and Barkley took full advantage of it being up for grabs while on air.
Ernie Johnson instantly reacted to his pal Barkley’s trolling with a very funny “Chuckster, you can’t be doing that!” Although, even he wondered why Smith had left his room key out.
While we’re guessing Smith promptly changed his room if he was still actually staying at that hotel, this is a very funny prank and one that embodies the spirit of what makes Inside the NBA so irresistible.
Even if Smith probably made a quick call to where he was lodging at the commercial break.
