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Stephen A. Smith has fired back at Charles Barkley after the basketball Hall of Famer suggested the ESPN star is being overexposed. Smith was responding to statements Barkley made about him during a recent appearance on Don’t @ Me With Dan Dakich.
“Stephen A.’s a friend of mine, but he needs to stop right now,” Barkley said. “My friends close to me give me a lot of credit. And I’m not blowing my own horn, I want to be on TV as less as possible, to be honest with you. That’s why I only do a couple of commercials a year. I don’t go on a bunch of shows. Less is more. Because the more you do, the less people take you serious.
“And I don’t feel the need to grab to grab every dime. I don’t feel the need to grab every dime at my disposal. Like, I’ve I’ve been arguing with my agent. He says, ‘You know we could do five to seven commercials a year.’ I said, ‘We’re going to do two commercials a year That’s it I don’t want to be on TV all the time.’ I get sick of seeing myself doing March Madness, but I don’t want to be on TV all the time. And I don’t do a bunch of TV stuff because I don’t want to because people get sick of you. That’s my number one thing. People will get sick on you. So I don’t want to be on TV more I want to be on TV less.
“As a matter of fact, I was in the studio last night and I saw he was going to be on Law & Order tonight. I mean he is already on General Hospital, he’s already on General Hospital, now he is going to be on Law & Order tonight, and I was just laughing. I was like, ‘Yo man, you are starting to be too much right now.’
“Like, you are going to be on CNN, you are going to be on Fox & Friends, now you on General Hospital, now you on Law & Order, I’m like, ‘Yo man, knock it off. Stop being on every TV show.’ Because at some point people are going to get sick of you, and you are going to be like, ‘Yeah, I probably did too much.’ But once you do too much, it’s too late and people don’t take you serious, and I think he’s got to be careful in that aspect.”
On Tuesday, Stephen A. Smith responded to Charles Barkley on his self-titled show.
“That’s my guy, but that doesn’t mean I always agree with him. And it doesn’t mean that I’m devoid of the right to call him a flaming hypocrite when it’s called upon,” Smith said. “Do y’all know how many commercials Charles Barkley does a year? He’ll tell us two. Have you seen Charles Barkley in two commercials? Are you kidding me? Oh, by the way, the cat that you work with at least twice a week during the NBA season is Shaquille O’Neal.
“Can we count the amount of endorsements he has? How often he’s seen everywhere? What new product he’s pitching? Did you say that about him? No, you didn’t. But when it comes to me, I need to be ‘careful.’”
Smith went on for awhile longer defending himself and finally concluded, “Charles Barkley, you continue to do the great job that you’ve been doing at TNT, and next year, it’ll start at ESPN. And let Shaq market the hell out of himself the way that he does significantly better than anybody on this planet. And let me do what I do.”