Charles Barkley has hope for the city of San Francisco after saying during the NBA All-Star Game broadcast that he met with Mayor Daniel Lurie.
The city was the host for the 2025 NBA All-Star Game. Barkley had been on the city’s case because of its crime and homeless population. During the broadcast, he expressed some optimism that the city would start cleaning up.
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“Shoutout to the people of San Francisco, especially the mayor. I met the mayor a couple times. He’s been tremendous, and hopefully we can do something about the homeless population,” Barkley said during a game between Team Shaquille O’Neal and Team Candace Parker.
Barkley said last month he would skip going to the game because it was in San Francisco.
“He’s going to make the All-Star Team,” Barkley said at the time. “I’m not going. I’m not going to that rat-infested place out in San Francisco.”
Barkley responded to one of his colleagues calling San Francisco “beautiful.”
“San Francisco is not a beautiful city. Rats. Cats. Y’all are not gonna make me like San Francisco. No. Nope, nope, nope”
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However, it was far from the first time he had criticized San Francisco. Last year, he ripped the city during the NBA’s alternative broadcast of the All-Star Game, which took place in Indianapolis.
Barkley asked Reggie Miller which he would choose: playing in the cold in Indianapolis – where Miller spent his entire 18-year NBA career – or “being around a bunch of homeless crooks in San Francisco.”
Golden State Warriors star Draymond Green called Barkley “crazy” and said that Barkley was not “welcome” in the city. Parker said, “we love San Francisco,” but Barkley offered a retort.
“No we don’t,” he said. “… You can’t even walk around down there.”
He later suggested you could walk around the city with a “bulletproof vest.”
Lurie has vowed to make San Francisco’s streets safe again, build “enough housing to turn around our affordability crisis” and tackle “our drug and behavioral health crisis.”
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