Charles Barkley calls out ‘idiots’ at ESPN for giving Lakers and Warriors a chance to make playoffs… before Kendrick Perkins fires back: ‘he’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer’
Charles Barkley has taken aim at the ‘idiots’ doing ESPN’s NBA coverage for giving the Lakers and Warriors a chance to make the playoffs.
While both teams have winning records, they’re just ninth and tenth respectively in a brutal Western Conference, and would have to win two play-in games as things stand just to make it into the postseason proper.
Barkley apparently doesn’t view LA and Golden State as real threats to make the playoffs, and took a shot at ESPN on Thursday night.
‘The idiots on the other network keep talking about the Lakers and the Warriors like they got a chance,’ he said on TNT’s ‘Inside the NBA.’
His co-panelist Shaquille O’Neal then said, ‘They do have a chance. It’s called the play-i
The Lakers are treating Saturday’s game like a playoff matchup
With huge standings implications, the Lakers are treating the Warriors game on Saturday as seriously as possible.
This late into the NBA season and with so many teams bunched up together in the Western Conference standings, every game starts to feel like a big matchup.
For the Lakers, there is no hyperbole in saying their game against the Golden State Warriors on Saturday is as big as it gets during the regular season.
“It’s going to be a big game, it’s almost a playoff game,” Rui Hachimura said after Lakers practice Friday. “We played them so many times I feel like — the preseason, the playoffs and regular-season games, all that. So, we know each other well.”
What makes this game so monumental? The Lakers are only a game ahead of the Warriors, so if they lose, they will be tied in the standings. A Golden State victory would also give them a 2-1 advantage in the season series with just one game left versus each other.
If the Warriors win out in these head-to-head games, it would give them the tiebreaker and pretty much guarantee the Lakers will be a tenth seed, needing to win two single-elimination road games to make the playoffs.
The good news is the Lakers have played the Warriors well over the past few years.
Since the 2019-20 campaign, the Lakers have a 10-6 record against the Warriors in the regular season, beat them in the 2021 play-in matchup and won the 2023 second-round series 4-2.
This year, the series is split. They lost the last game in February but had a thrilling double-overtime win on the road in January. That victory was one of the best wins of the season for the purple and gold.
These two teams know each other well and while Steph Curry and LeBron James are both listed as questionable, if everyone plays, it will undoubtedly have that playoff atmosphere Rui Hachimura discussed after practice on Friday.
Both teams know each other well, understand the consequences of a defeat and are playing in a marquee matchup in Los Angeles on national television.
If the Lakers can pull out the win, it’ll create more distance between them and Golden State and keep the hopes of jumping up to eighth or higher in the standings alive. A loss will raise some tough questions about how good this team is and drop them to tenth.
Hopefully, the former happens.
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