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Charles Barkley celebrated too soon. At the height of his unhappiness in Philadelphia in 1992, watching his prime being squandered, Barkley was told by his agent that his wish was finally being fulfilled. By day’s end, he would be joining the Lakers. When the 76ers backed out of the deal, the team was left to …
Charles Barkley celebrated too soon.
At the height of his unhappiness in Philadelphia in 1992, watching his prime being squandered, Barkley was told by his agent that his wish was finally being fulfilled. By day’s end, he would be joining the Lakers.
When the 76ers backed out of the deal, the team was left to play that night with a star forward whose BAC would surpass his PER.
“My agent calls me one morning and he says, ‘Hey, you’re going to get traded to the Lakers today. And me and my friends, we go out and celebrate and get drunk about noon,” Barkley said on ESPN’s The Lowe Post podcast. “I’m on cloud nine, he calls me back three hours later, it’s like 3:30 now, he says, ‘The Sixers backed out of the deal.’ And I’m drunk as [expletive] and we got a game that night, and I’m like, ‘What? What are you talking about?’ And he’s like, ‘The Sixers were scared to pull the trigger.’ And I said, ‘You’re kidding me. Dude, we got a game tonight and I’ve been drinking since noon.’
“The one thing that’s funny, I don’t even know how I played that night. I think I might have played bad because I was so angry the Sixers didn’t pull the trigger, and then it was just suffering the next two or three years.”
Though it is unclear which game Barkley is referring to, he wouldn’t be stuck in Philadelphia much longer. Barkley would be sent to Phoenix before the 1992-93 season in a lopsided trade for a package headlined by Jeff Hornacek and claim MVP that season, while leading the Suns to the league’s best record and an NBA Finals appearance.
