'$25 million? That's a problem": Charles Barkley catches NBA fans' flak after the magnitude of his gambling antics emerges
As NBA fans know, Charles Barkley loves to gamble. In the past, the Hall of Famer has been open about how much he enjoys gambling, and his desire to gamble away the rest of his money before death. Throughout his playing career, Barkley's career earnings sit at $40 million according to Spotrac. Of course, now Barkley is earning even more than that through his role with Inside the NBA.
back in 2022, Barkley signed a ten-year extension with TNT to remain with the network and on Inside the NBA. According to reports, Barkley's 10-year extension is worth upwards of $100 million a year as well, meaning he has quite a bit of money to gamble with.
As he explained to Shannon Sharpe on a recent episode of the NFL veteran's Club Shay Shay podcast, he's won more than a million dollars a number of times. Despite that, at the same time, he estimates that there have been 25 times where he's lost a million dollars.
"There's probably been seven times that I won a million dollars but there's probably been 25 times I've lost a million right uh so what happened was I quit gambling for two years." ...
"I had to change my mentality because you can never break the casino they can break your a** ... and my friends just sit me down and say yo man let's just go have fun for the weekend let's win some money or lose a little bit but that's what really happened when I would lose a million I was so depressed."
Conversation begins at the 2-hour 1-minute mark.
Looking back at Charles Barkley's previous comments about gambling in recent years
In the past, Charles Barkley has been quite open about his gambling addiction, and the steps he has taken to ensure it doesn't have a hold of his life. As he indicated on Club Shay Shay, the feeling of winning is never as good as the feeling of losing.
When winning a million dollars Charles Barkley indicated that he felt great, but that when he would lose a million he would feel terribly depressed. Because of this, he had to change his approach and rather than trying to win big, had to start playing to win - regardless of the amount.
Back in 2020 when the NBA legend made an appearance on In Depth with Graham Bensinger Barkley echoed a story similar to the one on Club Shay Shay. At the time, he believed that he had won a million dollars four or five times, but he had lost a million a lot more than he had won.
The comments came over a decade after the Hall of Famer had spoken to Phoenix TV in a 2007 interview where he spoke about the nature of his gambling habit. As he explained at the time during the 2007 Phoenix TV interview, the biggest problem he had with gambling was the fact that he could afford it.
Despite that, it took quite a few years for Charles Barkley to decide to quit gambling for two years as he explained to Shannon Sharpe.