NEW YORK — Charles Barkley plans to lobby for better graduation rates in his new job as a college basketball commentator.
CBS and Turner Sports’ new 14-year, $10.8 billion deal to televise the NCAA tournament adds announcers from the NBA broadcasts on TNT to March Madness. And Barkley is mad about how few Division I players, especially Black men, earn degrees.
“They got $10.8 billion. That’s a lot of freakin’ money,” Barkley told The Associated Press. “The players aren’t getting any of it, so clearly somebody is making money. I’m not opposed to people making money, but we do have an obligation, to, like, ‘OK, you know what? We’re making a (ton) of money. Let’s at least make sure these kids get educated.’”
When Turner Sports chief David Levy asked him about joining the college studio show, Barkley said he wouldn’t take part if he couldn’t get academic. He met with NCAA President Mark Emmert in Atlanta in January, which convinced him players shouldn’t be paid because it wasn’t fair to give athletes in some sports money but not others.
“He understands what this is all about,” says NCAA Vice President Greg Shaheen. “His comments are representative of the many issues in the environment of basketball we’re all trying to address. … It’s a great opportunity for him to comment on those topics.”
Barkley does believe, unlike the NCAA, that college players should be able to get loans from agents. He was surprised to learn that Black athletes have higher graduation rates than Black students as a whole, which left him even more dismayed.
According to the latest NCAA statistics, the graduation rate for Black Division I men’s basketball players was 58 percent. Barkley would like to see it be 70 percent — saying he figures there are three “boneheads” for every 10 college athletes.
