Charles Barkley urges young basketball players to spend more time in college

Charles Barkley, who has no issue mocking bad NBA teams, thinks the league would be better if players spent more time developing in college.

With GG Jackson leading the Memphis Grizzlies to a surprising victory over the Milwaukee Bucks Thursday night on TNT, the Inside the NBA crew highlighted the emerging prospect. But as the 45th overall pick in the NBA Draft last year, Barkley wishes the league’s youngest player spent more time in school.

“I wish a lot of these kids would learn their lessons,” Barkley said. “Just because your family and friends are freeloaders trying to get to your bank account, you don’t have to leave school early.”

There’s no question some players might benefit from another year in college before jumping to the NBA, but it seems wrong to question a person deciding to go pro and start collecting a paycheck the minute they’re eligible to do so.

“A lot of these guys, I tell them, ‘Go to college for a year or two, get in a stable environment, get some good coaching.’ Everybody’s in a hurry to get to the money,” Barkley ranted. “A lot of times you’re not ready. You’re just not ready mentally or physically. Go to college for a year or two, I think that would really help their development.”

Jackson did spend a year in college, but he opted out of his senior year in high school to jumpstart his NCAA basketball career. A five-star recruit and the consensus tom player in the 2023 class, Jackson initially committed to North Carolina after his junior season in high school. But he later decommitted from UNC and reclassified to the 2022 class where he enrolled at South Carolina, opting out of his senior year in high school to play his freshman season of college basketball.

If Jackson stayed in high school for his senior season and was currently a freshman at UNC, as initially planned, he would have had a better chance of being a lottery pick rather than getting selected in the second round the way he did last year. But he’s averaging more than 11 points in his rookie season and just led the Grizzlies to a win over a team with championship aspirations on national TV. It’s hard to say he shouldn’t be in the NBA right now.

[Inside the NBA]