As a character in the story of Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley is unique in that he was both an accomplice and an antagonist. When they were competitors in the 1993 Finals or teammates on the Dream Team, Jordan and Barkley were great friends, teeing off for rounds of golf between Finals games and gambling into the night together. But since Barkley criticized Jordan’s ownership style years ago, the two had a falling out.
Now, Barkley is taking issue with the way The Last Dance portrays Jerry Krause as the villain of the documentary.
“Anybody who thinks Jerry Krause broke up the Bulls has got to be a fool,” Barkley told Dan Le Batard on his radio show this week. “The reason they broke up the Bulls is they didn’t want to pay anybody.”
We catch up with the always outspoken Charles Barkley to get his reaction to The Last Dance and find out whether or not he and Michael Jordan can ever mend their relationship.
– Lorenzo pic.twitter.com/qofSl2Fewj— Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz (@LeBatardShow) May 12, 2020
Added Barkley: “When it was time to pay everybody, they broke up the team.”
Indeed, Krause is portrayed as the villain of The Last Dance, and many have taken issue with this aspect of the film. Reinsdorf is able to answer for his actions, but because Krause has passed away, his voice is missing. It gives Reinsdorf the convenient opportunity to put it all on his general manager, as in Episode 2, when Reinsdorf says he actively encouraged Scottie Pippen not to take the contract that Reinsdorf himself was offering him. It’s an obvious exaggeration, yet no one balances him out.
“Reinsdorf is throwing (Krause) under the bus and drove over him like 10 times,” Barkley told Le Batard.
As Barkley pointed out, Jordan’s contracts were small until his final two seasons with the Bulls as well, and Dennis Rodman and others were underpaid, too, even as contracts were ballooning around the league in a manner that would eventually lead to a lockout. Somehow, a dynasty kept its costs down.
“It’s Jerry Reinsdorf’s money,” Barkley said. “If he wanted to keep that team together, it would have stayed together.”
The film paints a slightly different picture, even if it is quite sympathetic to Pippen. Maybe this is Barkley’s way of continuing to take shots at Jordan, or he truly has an issue with the way the film was put together. Either way, Barkley also insisted to Le Batard that he is “too stubborn” to make amends with Jordan.
