Charles Barkley’s called Kendrick Perkins’ insinuation that NBA MVP voters have a racial bias for white players “asinine.”

“First Take” got animated Tuesday when JJ Redick questioned Kendrick Perkins’ insinuation that white MVP voters only voting for white players to win the MVP award while the two were discussing Nikola Jokic winning a third consecutive MVP trophy.

Barkley, who appeared on “Altitude Sports Radio,” wasn’t having it.

“Hey man, I’m trying to work on my golf game, and you’re already trying to make me talk about stupid stuff,” Barkley said. “Come on, man. That’s asinine, silly, and stupid. Listen, Joker has won 2 MVPs, well deserved. Him, Giannis, and Embiid are battling for the 3rd one this year. But the notion that people are voting, I mean you can probably count on one hand the white guys that won MVPs. Does he even know how many white voters are out there? Or did he just pull it out of his (expletive)?

“And if white voters want to vote only for white guys, why has a white guy only won it like five times in the last 30 years? Wouldn’t the numbers be way worse? And let me tell you something, I’m glad JJ challenged Perkins, because when I heard this for the first time last week, I said this has to be one of the most stupid things I’ve ever heard.”

Barkley said Perkins’ take is part of the ESPN culture.

“I always talk about ESPN disease,” Barkley told Altitude Sports Radio. “A lot of these guys, when they get on TV and stuff, they’re like, ‘well I’m on ESPN, I got to say something provocative.’ And you know the thing about it, you’re always gonna get some fools out there, you guys probably get some fools calling in agreeing with him! I can promise you this, I’ve never said anything on television just to get clicks, that don’t mean I’ve been right or wrong, whatever.

“But I’ve never said something like, ‘well I know people are going to react and go crazy, let me say this.’ And this is what bothers me also, man race is such a touchy subject because very few people have a pure heart. We can talk about race as much as you want to as long as you’re going to be fair and honest. But to slander this man (Jokić) in this situation is just total BS.”

Things got heated Tuesday on “First Take” when Redick cited Perkins’ claims last week about the voting process.

Perkins’ argument the past couple of weeks has been only three players outside the top 10 of season scoring leaders have ever won the MVP since the 1990s: Steve Nash, Nikola Jokic and Dirk Nowitzki.

“When it comes down to guys winning MVPs since 1990, it’s only three guys that won the MVP that wasn’t top-10 in scoring,” Perkins said last week. “Do you know who those three guys were? Steve Nash, Jokic and Dirk Nowitzki. Now, what do those guys have in common? I’ll let it sit there and marinate. You think about it.”

Redick countered Tuesday with Magic Johnson, who won a couple of MVP awards in 1987 and 1989. He insinuated Perkins conveniently stopped at 1990 as to not include Johnson.

What appeared to grab Redick’s attention was when Perkins added, “when it comes to MVP voting, when it comes to MVP voting, 80 percent of the voters are white American. Twenty percent are others. I know that stat.”

Redick replied: “What we’ve just witnessed is the problem with this show where we create narratives that do not exist in reality. The implication, what you are implying, that the white voters that vote on NBA are racist. That they favor white people. You just said that. Yes, you did! Yes, you did … That’s exactly what you implied, Kendrick Perkins.”

Mark Heim is a sports reporter for The Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Mark_Heim.