If I was going to trade somebody that I had respect for and appreciate, I would at least give them a heads up.”

Charles Barkley vented his frustration with how TNT handled the ESPN licensing deal, revealing that the crew was completely left in the dark.

Earlier this year, TNT’s Inside the NBA was facing cancellation due to a situation between the eponymous sports league and Warner Bros. Discovery. The tide recently changed in a big way, though, as the aforementioned network and its parent company struck a deal with ESPN to keep the show on the air well beyond the 2025 TV schedule.

Charles Barkley wasn’t gonna let the night go by without making a joke about their upcoming move to ESPN next fall.

Barkley’s contract with TNT, which will be honored despite the new licensing arrangement, is massive. He signed a new 10-year deal with the network in 2022 that could be worth up to $210 million. On Tuesday, Charles Barkley had this to say about the latest development:

Inside the NBA,” the Emmy-dominating halftime and postgame program starring Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith, Ernie Johnson and Shaquille O’Neal, will begin airing on ESPN and ABC next season, parent

Jalen Rose sat in for Kenny Smith on the popular show “Inside the NBA.” Rose stopped working with ESPN last year, but was a perfect co-host on the TNT program.