If you’ve watched any part of March Madness over the last few weeks, you’ve likely seen a Capital One commercial featuring one Charles Barkley.
It’s an annual campaign the credit card company runs with Barkley, Samuel L. Jackson, Jennifer Gardner and Jim Nantz that gets updated each year. In one of the spots this season, Barkley flies the crew to the Final Four in Phoenix on a blimp modeled after his likeness.
One version of the commercial ends with Barkley’s blimp deflating, leading his voice to become quite squeaky due to all the helium he’s inhaling (don’t worry about the science here, these spots are more about the vibes).
This is all relevant to understand why Barkley suddenly found his microphone on Saturday’s Final Four broadcast — and why his head immediately dropped. The TNT crew producing the show got him good.
Ernie Johnson set up him so perfectly with a sincere comment and when Barkley realizes it was all a ruse he can’t help but laugh. Fans similarly couldn’t get enough.
