The magic of Inside the NBA is that the crew is never afraid to go places that no other show would be willing to. The all-time example is Charles Barkley making jokes about the Jussie Smollett case and explaining to America that you should “not commit crimes with checks.”
On Tuesday night, we got another example from Chuck as Kenny Smith continued to push back on the rest of the guys wanting him to take on Stephen A. Smith in a free throw contest, insisting he’s “too good” for it. To make his point, he started a hypothetical about whether Jay-Z would battle rap a random guy on the street, but Chuck quickly stopped him by saying it’s probably “not a good time right now” to reference Jay-Z, as he was named in a lawsuit alongside Diddy accusing the two of raping a minor (which Jay-Z quickly denied and filed a motion to have it dismissed), which caused Shaq to walk off the desk to regain his composure, with Ernie close behind.
Kenny amended his example to Kendrick Lamar, while Chuck had the same grin on his face as he did when he was able to make his Jussie jokes, as no one is more proud of themselves when they get to tiptoe up to the line than Barkley. It’s rare Chuck gets to both be the jokester and voice of reason at the same time, but in this instance he was probably right that using Jay-Z as an example right now wasn’t the best timed reference, while also accomplishing his constant goal of getting Shaq to lose it.