Draymond Green has suggested that Myles Garrett’s frame would be perfect for rebounding and screen-setting in the NBA, in the mold of former player Reggie Evans. Charles Barkley wasn’t buying it.
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Asked on Candace Parker’s Post Moves podcast which NFL player could make the jump, Barkley didn’t name one. He used the question to go after a debate he says disrespects the people who actually play the game.
“None of them. None of them. I hate that stupid-ass question,” Barkley told Parker after she asked which NFL player could make it in the NBA. The question came from a fan, and Barkley said the debate shows little respect for either sport.
“We have these fools on television. They were arguing about NBA against NFL. I think it’s so disrespectful. To the skill set. To a skill set to think a random dude, which is what you are,” he added.
Charles Barkley then went after the kind of argument he hears on air. “What makes me laugh about that question is all these idiots talk about, it’s so funny. Well, I played in high school, the other sport. I’m like, yeah, your ass quit. Well, I was really good in high school. Well, did you play in college? No.” He ended with the line that anchors his point: “I think it’s disrespectful to think a regular dude, no matter how talented you are, can play a professional sport. I really do.”
At 6’4″ and 272 pounds, Garrett is one of the most physically gifted players in the NFL. He showed he could handle the ball and dunk in the 2019 All-Star Celebrity Game. Parker floated a comparison between Garrett and former Denver Nuggets big man Kenneth Faried, but Barkley rejected it. “He’s not near as athletic as Kenneth Faried,” Barkley said. His answer raises the question of whether the argument is really about athleticism at all.
The reporting on the exchange supports that distinction. A football player can be among the strongest and most explosive players in the world, but realistically can’t handle and shoot the ball the way basketball players do, and the same holds in reverse.
Garrett has set an NFL record for sacks in a season and shown some basketball ability. But Barkley believes that the NBA’s skill ceiling makes the whole conversation absurd. A celebrity-game dunk is real evidence of athleticism, but it isn’t evidence of how someone would handle NBA defenses over an 82-game season.
Barkley’s frustration also points at how the debate is framed. Countless NBA and NFL players have played both sports in high school, but only one in history has genuinely tried both at the professional level—and Barkley is asking whether the debater is that person. That is the gap he keeps pointing to when he asks whether a debater ever played in NBA.
Both sides of the debate now sit next to each other. Green sees a way a rare physical frame could fit into the NBA, and Barkley says the sport is too skilled to assume that. Neither can be tested, which is why the debate keeps coming back.