Charles Barkley was the Highlight of All-Star Saturday

Let me start off by apologizing for the lack of content around these parts lately. As most of you know, I now have an actual writing gig, covering the UF gymnastics beat for The Independent Florida Alligator, so that's kept me pretty busy lately. I'm also working on another blog that's strictly college basketball -- Beadlemaniacs -- for those who don't already know, so you can find my musings over there, too. But rest assured, 4th and Fail is still alive and kicking.

So, this weekend was NBA All-Star weekend, and the Saturday portion of the event was rather lackluster, namely, the dunk contest, which is supposed to be the marquee event of the day. I'm not going to tell you what can be done to fix the dunk contest, because that's what everyone else is writing. Instead, I will present you with the real highlights from All-Star Saturday night: Charles Barkley.

I don't want to say Charles Barkley was under the influence of anything, but there was something that made his commentary even more exquisite and on-point than usual. As the folk on Twitter put it: Chuck was killing it, Saturday night. You can find a sampling of his best from the weekend here, but I'll toss you some of my favorites; you can thank me later:

• "You ever notice Gatorade don't work for players who suck."
• "You wanna take Ernie (Johnson)'s job? All you gotta do is cut your forehead back 7-8 inches."
• "It'd be impressive if he was taller than one of them," - on Nate Robinson bringing the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders out on the court before one of his dunks.
• And of course: "Maybe no one will win it." - before Cheryl Miller announced the winner of the contest.

Among the other topics the future governor of Alabama took a shot at: the Heat's Daequan Cook, Spike Lee for wearing Knicks gear, the Cubs (saying all Cubs gear should be burned), Paul Pierce's merits as a shooter and of course, Kenny "The Jet" Smith's hairdo. And for the record, the Cook and Cubs comments were back-to-back. Oh, and he called Kings' rookie Omri Casspi (who competed in the H-O-R-S-E competition) "Omar." Never change, Chuck. Never change.

So there you have your highlights from All-Star Saturday, and further reason that Charles Barkley should be given his own late night talk show, uncensored, for an hour -- minimum -- each night.