NBA legend Charles Barkley came from very humble beginnings in Leeds, Alabama. Thanks to his incredible basketball career, Barkley made millions. While fortune made his life comfortable, it also came with its pitfalls. Notably, it wasn’t very easy for the Hall of Famer to continue his friendships because of his newfound wealth. The Philadelphia 76ers legend has always been candid about his opinions and views. So he did not mind talking about his struggles with his friends.

Barkley currently has an estimated net worth of $60 million. Furthermore, he recently signed a massive contract extension with TNT as an analyst.

Charles Barkley was in a lose-lose situation

Charles Barkley released his memoir ‘I May Be Wrong But I Doubt It’ in 2002. It was a best seller and reportedly sold over 125,000 copies. In the book, Barkley talked about various things like his NBA career, weight issues, his personality, race, etc. In chapter 7 titled ‘Being Rich’, the 1993 NBA MVP revealed some of his interesting experiences as a rich guy.

During one instance, Barkley opened up about his struggle to maintain his relationships because of his fortune. He noted that he had lent a lot of his friends and relatives huge sums of money over the years in an attempt to be on their good side. But most of them didn’t even speak to him after.

Barkley wrote, “I’ve probably lost between $600,000 and $700,000 lending money to my friends and relatives. Most of the friends I’ve loaned money to won’t even speak to me now. It’s the strangest damned thing.”

He noted that it was “weird” being rich at first. However, he still liked his old friends and wanted to maintain friendship with them even though he had outgrown them. Barkley added, “You’ve outgrown most of them, really, but you really want to maintain relationships. And they want to borrow money and you do it. You say yes and it’s almost like buying friendship to stay in good with ’em. And then they turn on you, too.”

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The 11x NBA All-Star also stated that if he decided to not loan money to his friends, they wouldn’t be happy. So, either way, it was a loss-loss situation for the former star.

Charles Barkley’s stance

Charles Barkley does not mind spending his hard earned money for charity. Over the years, the former player had given back major donations, especially to educational institutions. Notably, Barkley has made several donations to his alma mater, Auburn University.

However, he recently revealed that he is not ready to pay huge bucks for NIL deals to bring superstars to the school. He said that he would do anything for the institution. However, he made it clear that he won’t give “unlimited access” to his money.

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