There’s no telling what’s going to happen at TNT after 2025. That’s why Inside the NBA is making this season count. Or so that’s the promise. There’s a lot of anticipation that the (probably) final season of the 35-year-old show will be grand and almost every NBA on TNT personality has promised it. But Charles Barkley paints a whole other picture. The same guy who canceled retirement and turned down a bigger payday to stay at TNT. Is he regretting it already?

Sir Charles was on all four hours of The Mike Misanelli Show this week and inevitably the TNT discussion came up. As he’s mentioned a few times recently, Chuck is still not sure what Turner’s plans are. He even expressed the grim reality that the three-decade-old marquee NBA show would have to pay $300,000 for highlights. He makes it sound like a joke but that’s the real picture.

When Missanelli said they were going to play a montage of the greatest moments of Inside the NBA, Chuck extended the highlights joke. “Did you pay for those highlights?” The Philly sports veteran who’s been on air as long as Inside the NBA, went along with the skit. He claimed they have a good credit account at TNT which gives Missanelli the confidence to say, “I called up TNT, said Chuck said it’s okay.”

Barkley’s just surprised, “They answer the phone now?” Who at TNT had the audacity to reject Charles Barkley’s call to warrant that? Yet Chuckster says, “We working with a skeleton crew. We don’t have an operator anymore. We working with a skeleton crew down there.”

It’s neither a Star Wars reference nor is it like an old Disney cartoon with literal undead skeletons pulling their weight. There might be the bare minimum crew at Turner’s Atlanta offices because it’s the offseason for the NBA on TNT. Or Barkley might be implying the situation is worse than it looks.

Charles Barkley wants to save jobs at TNT

Charles Barkley announced his retirement before the NBA media rights deal was finalized. But once the NBA turned down TNT’s matching rights offer, Chuck had to re-evaluate his plans. He nearly reconsidered going to one of the new partners – NBC or Amazon, never ESPN – if he’s stiffed out of his existing contract. He, however, didn’t want to restart with a new crew excluding Shaquille O’Neal, Ernie Johnson, Kenny Smith and the entire TNT team, and chose to stay.

Turner convinced him by assuring that the Inside the NBA employees won’t lose their jobs and they’d find a way to keep the show going. Shortly after, he revealed that rival networks offered him $100 million more than his existing $210 million contract. He left that on the table to remain with TNT with hopes of saving some jobs.

So his joke gives us a fair degree of anxiety. Is it just the offseason or are there really no humans at TNT anymore? It might get worse if the network doesn’t come up with a plan sooner about the final season and beyond. What has become obvious is that Barkley is desperately waiting for TNT to come up with a plan. And his impatience is spilling out with every media appearance with dark humor.