Hey guys, before I ask this question just know I'm from Holland in Europe. I was talking to this guy and we were discussing basketball and he said his favourite player used to be Charles Barkley. Then he mentioned a story I had never heard of before and cannot find on the internet, but it could still be true. He claimed he saw a game where Barkley was talking to his coach and then punched the referee. The coach basically told him if you punch him, I will pay the fine. This is all I know, although I did ask him if he remembered what team he was on: Sixers, Suns or the Rockets? He said he thinks he was on the Rockets Anybody have a story that even comes remotely close to this?
I don't think any NBA player has ever punched an NBA ref during a game. I do remember this incident overseas though, the ref ended up losing his vision. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YOsh9bCj_k There's been worse soccer fan/coach VS ref violence though. http://abcnews.go.com/US/soccer-referee-punched-teen-player-dies/story?id=19112917 Being a ref is really a thankless job at the volunteer levels and of course the lower end high school levels. People criticize you when you make the wrong calls, and someone will hate you even if you make the right ones.
I vaguely remember something about him shoving a ref over a table, but I can't find proof of it. A player who did hit a ref was Nick Van Exel: http://articles.latimes.com/1996-04-11/sports/sp-57305_1_van-exel
Barkley is more than my favorite player of all time; he is my hero. I became a Rockets Season Ticketholder because of him, the very day they signed him. They let me kiss the trophy because I was first there. I can say .... Barkley never punched a ref. Any other Barkley trivia you want answered, even back to Auburn days, pass it on to me. US Fans tend to skew the facts with him for some reason. This never happened. OP, this is what happens. People hate Barkely and make up **** then innocent guys like Invinsible Fan "vaguely remember" it as truth and still post it without proof
He jumped over a table to chase a ref, later got fined for it. It was part of a badboy image the media tried to play on him during his Suns days. Still trying to think of the player who pushed the ref over a table now...
So, you are not certain he never pushed a ref over a table...right? Barkley punched Bill Lambier just like Larry Bird did. The media portrayed him as a bad boy as a sixers for the spitting incident, much before the Suns. The reason he is my hero is because as a Sixers the media was crazy about saying black athletes like him need to be role models, and they used the spitting incident as an example. Barkley was rhetorically asked, "You're a role model, right?" and he said, at age 24? ... "I'm not a role model, parents and teachers are." And that even lit up the media more by him saying athletes are not role models. But he was right. That took huge guts for a 24yr old to take on the media like that. Dude never punched a ref.,,,and never jumped over a table to chase a ref. Give us a link or stop the slander.
There's a video burned in memory of some player pushing a ref over a table...anyways not the point. http://www.nytimes.com/1993/01/19/s...ley-explodes-but-it-s-knicks-who-sparkle.html BTW, I don't think it was a reputation Charles tried to avoid. It's not like he never showed a history of fighting on or off the court. These days, fans like that in their players. A bad rep would be like drugs or beating women.
I wouldn't call it guts. To me it was more Barkely being Barkley and talking about of his ass. And as far as the media giving him the bad boy image... Didn't he put a guy through a window at a bar? He may not have came out and said he was a bad boy but, he liked swagger/attention the media gave him. Hands down one of my favorite players.
Barkley basically stated what other players wanted to say... The reporters would ask a dumb question and Barkley would basically give him his answer and not the MS. AMERICA answer... Barkley threw the guy out of the window later in his career, when he was with Houston and the man was being an @$$... http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1997-10-27/sports/9710270306_1_jorge-lugo-lugo-s-attorney-barkley-s-group I'm there with HP on Barkley... He wasn't a bad boy, he just didn't take crap from anyone..... T_Man
