For a 48-hour period in 1984, Charles engaged in an eating binge in hopes of dissuading the Philadelphia 76ers from selecting him in the draft. He began with two Denny’s Grand Slam breakfasts – six pancakes and bacon totaling around 1,660 calories, and a vanilla milkshake to wash it down. The lunch offerings, which have varied in the decades’ worth of repeat tellings, included either Kentucky Fried Chicken, mashed potatoes, and coleslaw; half of the menu at Red Lobster; two McDonald’s fish fillets, a large fries, and a Diet Coke; or two Texas-sized barbecue sandwiches. The dinner menu at a steakhouse included a T-bone, baked potato, and, of course, three desserts.
Charles repeated it all the next day, gorging, as he described, “everything I could get to my face, everything that wasn’t nailed down or poison.” During a night of heavy drinking with his agent, the sight of Charles crushing beers might have made people think that Prohibition was about to be reinstated, he said.
This excess consumption was never the plan, but the league’s unstable footing complicated Charles’s financial future.
The NBA was struggling. On top of the rampant cocaine abuse among players, TV executives and advertisers felt the league was not marketable to mainstream America because it was too Black. Critics supported the notion that by pointing to Marvin Gaye’s rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner at the 1983 All-Star Game, a groundbreaking, funky version of the national anthem meant to reflect the Black excellence of the players on the court. All of this came as salaries had spiked too quickly and several franchises were in danger of folding.
To address the escalating problems plaguing the league, the collective bargaining agreement announced for the 1984–85 season helped institute a salary cap. Teams with payrolls at or above the salary cap could only offer their first-round picks a one-year deal worth $75,000. In other words, whoever was getting picked by Philadelphia, a franchise capped out at around $4.5m, would not have the security of a multiyear, multimillion-dollar deal.
Charles had already lost about 10lbs that summer, a request made by the 76ers before a pre-draft weigh-in. Then, Charles’s agent, Lance Luchnick, had some tough news to deliver to his prized client.
“You do know if the Sixers draft you they are going to give you $75,000, right?” Luchnick said to Charles.
“I didn’t leave college for $75,000,” Charles replied to his new agent in a not-so-calm tone.
By Charles’s standards, the caloric clinic worked: he gained roughly 20lbs in two days, putting him at nearly 300lbs.
At a weigh-in, Harold Katz, the 76ers’ owner who made his fortune as founder of Nutrisystem, the national chain of weight-loss centers, flew off the handle as Charles tried not to laugh. Are you nuts or just fat and lazy? Pat Williams, the team’s loquacious general manager, was rendered speechless and alarmed by “this enormous girth.”
On the Amtrak train to New York for the draft, Charles and Luchnick high-fived each other on a job well done. There was no way the 76ers would take Charles Barkley now. No way.
That’s what they thought anyway.
Charles was certainly not a secret to the Sixers. Months earlier, Jack McMahon, the team’s director of player personnel, described the Auburn star to Sports Illustrated as having the body of Wes Unseld and the ups of Julius Erving, while also noting that any team that took him on would “have to put a weight clause in his contract.” But the owner, Katz, spoke of Charles glowingly.
“Harold was in awe of Charles Barkley,” said John Nash, then the team’s assistant general manager.
The entrepreneur bought the 76ers from F Eugene Dixon for more than $12m in 1981, inheriting a pricy payroll, low attendance, and significant financial losses. Katz, a ball of fire…
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