Tiger Woods’ Swing Nearly Brought Charles Barkley To Tears

Tiger Woods’ Swing Nearly Brought Charles Barkley to Tears

If there’s anybody that knows what a bad golf swing looks like it is Charles Barkley. His swing was so funky that he created a TV show along with renowned swing coach Hank Haney to try and fix it. So really all he has to do is take a look at some of his old tape, or according to the “Chuckster”,  just watch Tiger Woods play right now. And Barkley is right. After coming back for the Bridgestone Invitational, Tiger felt he was ready to take on the PGA Championship. Clearly he wasn’t as he missed the cut. I’m not sure what the future holds for Tiger and I’m not sure whether or not he will get back to something close to the level he has been in the past, but Tiger needs to take some time, work on his swing, and find himself because he clearly isn’t right.

Charles Barkley joined XX Sports Radio in San Diego with Scott Kaplan and Vencie Glenn to talk about whether or not he thinks the lockout in the NBA will last a while, if he thinks star players will go play overseas, whether or not he has heard from Tiger, if it is true that Tiger doesn’t return Barkley’s text messages anymore, and whether or not he knew about Tiger’s transgressions.

Whether or not he thinks the lockout in the NBA will last a while:

“I don’t think they’re gonna play at all this year. I feel bad to be honest with you, I feel bad for the people who work for the teams and the people who work for the arenas. The players and the owners are going to be fine because it’s gonna get settled at some point. The NBA has already laid off 100 people so it’s gonna get ugly, real ugly.”

If he thinks star players will go play overseas:

“No I don’t think Kobe Bryant is going to Turkey. Kobe Bryant, I want to get my numbers right, but I think he has three years and 83 million dollars, so could you imagine him going to Turkey or China for a couple of million dollars and blowing an Achilles or knee out? When you have 83 million dollars coming in the next three years, first of all you should already be financially set, but that’s too much to risk. You can’t risk that money playing overseas.”

Whether or not he has heard from Tiger:

“Nope and hey you know what? I just feel sadness right now to be honest with you. I hate to see him struggling. To be honest with you I almost started crying last week. I was up at the Basketball Hall-Of-Fame watching that Friday afternoon before the ceremony and when he snap-hooked that drive into the woods, chipped out, snap-hooked the other ball I was like wow! What the hell? I feel bad. He was a great friend of mine, I still love him to death, I wish him the best, and like I said I talked to the guy every week for 15 years and we haven’t talked to him since the accident. It is what it is and I just hope he’s alright. That’s the only thing. I don’t have to hang out with Tiger Woods but I really love the guy and want to make sure he’s alright. Clearly he’s not alright and I just feel sadness for him to be honest with you.”

If it is true that Tiger won’t return his text messages:

“He changed his number. We talked I think the day of the accident and I haven’t talked to him since then. My number hasn’t changed. I just want the dude to be alright. This is starting to get ugly. You know it’s funny, I was watching T.V. this morning and they were having a debate whether he should play on the President’s Cup team. Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? That would be so unfair to the other players. I’m not one of those big lifetime achievement guys. I took some heat when we were talking about Tim Duncan playing in the All-Star Game. I said Tim Duncan is the greatest power forward ever, but he should not be starting in the NBA All-Star Game. That’s why I hate the fans picking the All-Star team. To me the All-Star Game you reward the guys for having a great first half of the season. I don’t believe in lifetime achievement awards. Tiger does not deserve to be on the President’s Cup team. Plain and simple. I love the guy, I wish him the best, but he does not deserve to be on the President’s Cup team at this point.”

What he knew about Tiger’s transgressions:

“Let me make one thing perfectly clear because I have heard that assertion. Number one if Hank Haney and Steve Williams didn’t know it and they spent 300 or 200 days a years with Tiger how are we gonna know? Let me make this one point about this whole thing. Even though I talked to Tiger every week for those 15 years we’ve actually only been together 20 times to be honest with you. He had a busy life and I had a busy life. Listen dude I would never get on here and tell you that we didn’t know that if we knew it. We had no idea. Steve Williams has said it, Hank Haney has said it, and those guys spent 200 days a year with him.”