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Charles Barkley - Philadelphia
76'ers Great |
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 Future Hall of Famer Charles Barkley
brought vitality, attitude and a
host of skills to professional
basketball, maturing into one of the
league's most respected,
awe-inspiring and recognizable
individuals. One of the NBA's 50
Greatest Players of All Time, he won
the Most Valuable Player Award in
1993 and was a perennial member of
the All-Interview Team, but retired
in 2000 after 16 seasons without
winning an NBA Championship. Upon
his retirement, he ranked 13th in
the NBA in career scoring with
23,757 points and 15th in rebounding
with 12,546 rebounds, finishing with
career averages of 22.1 points and
11.7 rebounds in 1,073 games. He is
one of only four players, with
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wilt
Chamberlain and Karl Malone, to post
more than 23,000 points, 12,000
rebounds and 4,000 assists in his
career. He also was the leading
scorer on the gold-medal-winning
U.S. Olympic basketball teams in
1992 at Barcelona and 1996 at
Atlanta. At 6-6 and 252 pounds
(leaner than in his college days),
Barkley had an unusual build for a
basketball player-much stockier than
most small forwards, yet far shorter
than the league's power forwards. He
nevertheless could outmaneuver and
outsmart bigger players and
overpower smaller opponents. He was
fluid on the break, a powerful
jumper, a deadeye shooter from any
angle and one of those rare talents
who performed at his best in the
clutch. In addition, Barkley managed
to be outspoken and outrageous but
likable all the same....Book
Charles Barkley for Your Event
In his three-year college career at
Auburn, Barkley averaged 9.6
rebounds and became known as "the
Round Mound of Rebound" for his heft
and his hunger for caroms. He was
the Southeastern Conference Player
of the Year in 1984 but didn't make
the U.S. Olympic basketball team
that season. He entered the 1984 NBA
Draft as a junior and was taken by
the Philadelphia 76ers with the
fifth overall pick. After averaging
14.0 points and 8.6 rebounds as a
rookie, Barkley posted averages of
20 or more points and at least 10
rebounds per game for 11 seasons in
a row with Philadelphia and Phoenix
before finishing his career with
four seasons with the Houston
Rockets. His achievements were
remarkable. He was an All-NBA First
Team selection in 1988, 1989, 1990,
1991 and 1993, an All-NBA Second
Team pick in 1986, 1987, 1992, 1994
and 1995 and an All-NBA Third Team
choice in 1996. He was selected to
11 All-Star Games, received more
All-Star votes than any other player
in 1994, and was MVP in the 1991
All-Star classic. In 1986-87 he led
the NBA in rebounding (14.6 rpg),
and the next year he finished fourth
in scoring (28.3 ppg). He topped the
NBA in offensive rebounding for
three straight years and is among
the league's all-time leaders in
field goal percentage. He scored 56
points in a single playoff game in
1994, the third-highest total ever.
In 1992 he was part of the original
U.S. Olympic Dream Team that won a
gold medal in Barcelona, and in 1996
he was part of the Dream Team that
won a gold medal at Atlanta. Popular
with fans and the media, he made the
All-Interview team for each of his
last 13 seasons in the league.
Barkley spent eight seasons in
Philadelphia. The 76ers' best
showing during his tenure with them
was a five-game loss to the Boston
Celtics in the 1985 Eastern
Conference Finals after the Sixers
went 58-24 in the regular season.
When the team failed to make the
postseason in 1991-92, Barkley was
involved in one of the most
significant trades in recent memory.
Philadelphia traded him to the
Phoenix Suns in exchange for Jeff
Hornacek, Tim Perry and Andrew Lang.
Unhappy in his last years in
Philadelphia, Barkley found new life
in Phoenix. He had a magical first
season with the Suns, winning the
NBA MVP Award while leading Phoenix
to the league's best record and a
berth in the 1993 NBA Finals. The
Suns lost to Michael Jordan and the
Chicago Bulls in a memorable
six-game series. Over the next two
seasons Barkley struggled with
nagging injuries, and the Suns
struggled with him. They reached the
conference semifinals in 1994 and
1995 but lost to the Houston Rockets
both years. Barkley bounced back
with a big season in 1995-96, but
the Suns dipped to 41-41. Changes
seemed inevitable for a franchise
that had come close to the
championship but fallen short. On
August 19, 1996, Barkley was traded
again. This time, the destination
was Houston, where he joined stars
Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler on
a team with title aspirations. For
the Suns, the trade meant instant
rebuilding, as it brought them
promising young players Sam Cassell
and Robert Horry and veterans Chucky
Brown and Mark Bryant. For Barkley,
it was one last chance to achieve
the one thing that had escaped him:
an NBA championship. It didn't
happen, however. In 1996-97 and
1997-98 the Rockets were eliminated
in the playoffs by Utah, and in
1998-99, when they were ousted by
the Los Angeles Lakers. In
1999-2000, when Barkley missed most
of the season because of a torn left
quadriceps tendon, Houston failed to
make the postseason. Barkley
announced his retirement shortly
after he was injured in December,
but came back to play one final game
before the home fans in Houston on
April 19.
>>> Book Charles Barkley for Your Event
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