Charles Barkley on Alabama, Auburn, Rush Limbaugh, and Much More

Former NBA star Charles Barkley entertains hundreds of players, fans, and media at the Mayor's Banquet the day before the Central Michigan and Troy football teams are scheduled to play each other at the GMAC Bowl in Mobile, Alabama. Barkley sounds off on the two teams, the Alabama Crimson Tide, Rush Limbaugh and much more.

Full transcript below:

Emcee:

Please welcome Sir Charles Barkley.

Charles Barkley:

When they told me the mayor was Sam Jones, I got excited. I didn't realize it was going to be this Sam Jones. I thought it was going to be the real Sam Jones.

I haven't got a chance to meet Dan LeFevour, but the message to him is he still will never be as big as Dan Majerle.

I want to give a shout out to the Trojans because their coach was at Auburn when I was there and I was joking with him. He tried to get me to play football. And I told him, "Coach, I tried to play football one day. It wasn't a lot of fun for me."

I told Coach Blakeney if he wanted to win a couple more games, all he's gotta do is get that Alabama preseason schedule.

I'm an Auburn fan and these Alabama fans... This could be the longest year of our lives if they win. This could be the longest week. This is going to be the longest 3 or 4 days for Auburn people they are the worst winners in the history of civilization. I mean they are the worst winners in the history of civilization. So we're kind of walking around on egg shells. We can't wait for this week to be over.

If they lose this game, this will be devastating for like a month. It will be unbelievable. I mean, seriously, they'll be like mass suicides. It'll be like Jim Jones again. I mean they might actually kill themselves.

I always tell people the 3 saddest days of my life: the day Elvis died, the day JFK died, and the day Alabama fired Mike Shula. I was like, "Please don't fire him. Please don't fire him. He's the best coach we got at Auburn."

I think one of the reasons that I'm successful on television. I always tell people that I'm never going to lie and I think that's important and significant. I could be an idiot like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity and Lou Dobbs and all those guys who have a check, that's full of it. But I say television is a very powerful thing. People believe what we say and I said I will never use it for my financial gain. Whether people agree or disagree, I think it's important to always try to be honest when you're on television.

I want to thank everybody very much and, hey, have fun at the game too. Thank you very much.