When Charles Barkley left Philadelphia, the city all but lost hope of winning an NBA championship. But with Sir Charles’ retirement, the 11-time NBA All-Star and winner of two Olympic gold medals, returned to the place where it all started for him for a special speaking engagement.

Hosted by Bobbito Garcia, the event, which took place at Sneaker Villa’s South 52nd Street flagship, allowed high schoolers to engage in an intimate discussion with the one-time power forward of the Philadelphia 76ers. As Barkley spoke candidly about his early rookie years, his proudest moments as a player on the Dream Team and some of his controversial comments, Nike also unveiled two sets of Air Force 1’s, all inspired by Sir Charles storied career.

With both sets to be released a month a part from the other, the November shoe is inspired by his participation with Dream Team and the other will be in remembrance of his career after the 76ers and will drop the early part of December.

Once it was all said and done, Barkley had a private session with members of the press. Always the controversial and outspoken personality, Barkley emphasized the need to address much of the ills plaguing Black America such as Black-on-Black crime and the lack of priority on education.

The Evil Collector says, “Let’s hope he has some interesting plans if he were to ever seriously run for office.”

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 13th, 2007 at 4:44 pm and is filed under Shoes, Lifestyle Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.