Barkley Easily Athlete MVP of 'SNL' Hosts

There have been many professional athletes or former athletes that have hosted “Saturday Night Live” over the years; in fact, the number of athlete hosts approaches 30, but of all of those athlete hosts there is only one who has hosted multiple episodes. That is Pro Basketball Hall of Famer and current TNT NBA analyst Charles Barkley, who last night hosted ‘SNL’ for his third time. 

Why is Barkley the only athlete or former athlete to ever host ‘SNL’ more than once? It’s because he’s the best, and in my opinion, it’s not even close.

“Saturday Night Live” has had athlete hosts for almost as long as the legendary sketch comedy show has existed. The very first athlete host was Pro Football Hall of Famer and legendary Minnesota Vikings quarterback Frank Tarkenton back in 1977. Other notable athletes who hosted the show include O.J. Simpson, Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, Deion Sanders, Jeff Gordon, Bill Russell, Joe Montana, Walter Payton, George Foreman, Derek Jeter, Tom Brady, Lance Armstrong and Peyton Manning.

Almost always episodes hosted by athletes are absolutely horrible. Of that entire list I previously mentioned, only Manning really hosted a decent episode. It’s so bad when athletes host that most of the time when they’re announced a feeling of dread comes over me well before the famous “Live from New York, it’s Saturday night …” is read. We fans have been quite thankful that, other than Barkley, there hasn’t been an athlete host the show in three and a half years since Olympic gold medal winning swimmer Michael Phelps hosted (that was a particularly dreadful episode) in 2008.  

What sets Barkley apart though?

Most of it has to do with that fact that Barkley is just an all-around funny and fun-loving guy in real life. His exuberant personality has led many times to pregame, postgame and halftime shows on TNT basketball coverage being funnier than entire episodes of ‘SNL.’ Most athletes that ‘SNL’ has chosen to host other than Barkley simply don’t have these funny personas. In fact, Manning has absolutely zero personality, which is why the fact that his hosting stint wasn’t half-bad was extremely impressive and surprising.

There is one knock on Barkley that seems to pop up on social media sites like Twitter when Sir Charles stops by Studio 8H for ‘SNL’ and that’s that Barkley is a “bad actor” and “noticeably reads cue cards.” Both of those knocks are actually true, but I must ask, “what’s the big deal?” We all know going in that Barkley isn’t an actor and we also all know going in that these guys, including the cast members, read off of cue cards. If the humor of the show is funny and Barkley gets laughs, which he does, than these shouldn’t really hurt the episode.

Now, if I had to choose a list of the greatest hosts in ‘SNL’ history or my personal favorite ‘SNL’ hosts I doubt that Barkley would appear on either list, but when it comes to athletes hosting he honestly is a unanimous MVP.