Charles Barkley Assigns Blame For Kevin Durant's NBA Finals Injury

Since Kevin Durant went down with an injury in the first half of Game 5 of the NBA Finals, there has been plenty of finger pointing at who’s to blame.

So who is to blame?

NBA Hall of Famer Charles Barkley says the Golden State Warriors are absolutely to blame for KD’s injury, because they’re the ones who allowed him to compete.

During an appearance on ESPN’s Get Up on Tuesday morning, Barkley explained:

“You’ve been asking these guys all morning if there’s somebody to blame. Yes, there is somebody to blame: the Golden State Warriors for putting KD out there. Listen, that was not right. If you go back and look at the last two weeks—the article comes out, KD’s worst nightmare that the Warriors are winning without him. Then you come out, you read the articles, the Warriors are really unhappy that KD won’t risk his Achilles, they’re frustrated with KD. Now this man has to be feeling some type of way, so I blame the Warriors for KD getting hurt, and I don’t care what they say about it. They shouldn’t have put that man out there. You know how I know it? Because he blew out his Achilles.”

“I don’t think you can ever leave it up to a player. Players always want to play. But … to put a guy, who hasn’t played basketball in over a month into Game 5 of the Finals, and had some type of move around the day before, I don’t think that’s fair to that man, and you saw the result—it’s just not fair. It’s Game 5 of the world championship. He hasn’t played real basketball in a month. That’s unfair to put him in that situation, and the proof is in the pudding, plain and simple.”

“I blame the Warriors for KD getting hurt and I don’t care what they say about it.”

Charles Barkley brought the heat, saying the Warriors shouldn’t have played Kevin Durant in Game 5 pic.twitter.com/uyTgg2qsCS

— Get Up (@GetUpESPN) June 11, 2019