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ESPN is increasing the output of Inside the NBA episodes and adding more of them to the early-season docket, the network announced Thursday.
Last season, ESPN began licensing the iconic studio show—featuring Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal, and Kenny Smith—from TNT Sports in exchange for a package of Big 12 football and basketball games after Warner Bros. Discovery lost its NBA package in the league’s latest media rights deal. There were 20 regular-season dates, and it was sporadic, particularly in the early part of the season.
For example, there was only one episode between Halloween and Christmas last year, and this year, there will be four. Altogether, there will be 25 Inside the NBA dates on ESPN or ABC this season.
Barkley himself was among those clamoring for more early-season shows.
“We’ve complained, we’ve only been on ESPN four times in three months,” Barkley told Dan Le Batard this past January. “I don’t like that at all. What I was talking about working all the time, because I love watching basketball —I’m not going to do all these damn shows. I’m not gonna be on ESPN One, Two, Three, Deportes, Nacho, Echo, whatever they call it. I’m not gonna be doing all that, but I wish we had been on more during the first half of the season.”
He echoed that criticism on a recent appearance on The Bill Simmons Podcast, noting that they only worked one day in November and once in December—on Christmas. “I didn’t like that at all, ’cause the fans like, ‘well, damn, when are they gonna be on again?’ We’re like, ‘We’re on once a month.’”
Meanwhile, Barkley has also been saying that this is his last year with the crew. “I’m looking forward to this last year. TV has been great for me. I’m stepping back from public life,” Barkley told WSFA in Alabama last month.
Barkley has alluded to retirement from TV for a number of years, but this is the most direct he’s been about looming finality. Regardless of whether or not this season ultimately winds up being his last on Inside the NBA, basketball fans will have more opportunities to enjoy the legendary broadcaster and studio show during the upcoming season.
