The home of all things basketball.
Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant took to Twitter to reassure everyone, and each other, that it's all good between them after a jab from Bryant resurfaced online.
SACRAMENTO – This bone spur in Kobe Bryant’s left foot? He has had it for years. Years. He has played through it for years without publicizing it and the challenges it has prompted him …
Shaquille O'Neal, the NBA's giant of giants, tweeted to the world that he will retire from professional basketball in a 16 second video.
By Robert Carberry When one thinks of basketball player Shaquille O'Neal, the image of the big "Shaq" pops into the mind. A dominant player for years, the 7 foot 1, 330-pound mountain is a nightmare to play against for opposing teams. He has been voted into the top 50 players of all time. He will certainly go to the Hall-of-Fame. He has made an outlandish amount of money in the sport he loves. Millions upon millions of dollars to play a game, Shaq has everything a man can want in terms of property and possessions. Superman Shaq and Dwight O'Neal is interesting for other reasons, though. Despite all of his wealth, he has a desire to do good in life. Perhaps it is due to his mother and stepfather, a military man named Phil Harrison, that have guided him. Shaq always refers to Harrison as his father without a blink. In reality that is so since Harrison did all the heavy-lifting in terms of raising a family. Shaquille married his longtime girlfriend with whom he has children. That may not sound like a big deal but it sends a message. This is particularly true for the black community since the out-of-wedlock birthrate is an astounding 70%. Marriage sends a positive message instead of the view of another athlete just running around impregnating anything that moves. O'Neal also went back and got his college degree. A cynic would say, "Why bother?" but it is an accomplishment for him and a promise to his mother. It also says college is important since virtually nobody will become an NBA player despite the marketing of it everywhere. You have a better chance of getting hit by lightning. Monster block on Kobe Most interesting is his interest in police work. Shaq is already a reserve officer for Miami Beach paid $1 a year. He holds a similar title for Bedford County, Virginia. He is also a U.S Deputy Marshal where his focus is preventing predators of children. When legendary basketball player George Mikan passed-away recently, O'Neal stepped-up and paid the funeral expenses since Mikan received just a $1,400-a-month pension from the NBA. Money-wise, Mikan came at the wrong time and O'Neal stepped into a windfall, right or wrong. But Shaq's decency is what this is all about. In an era of absurdly paid athletes, greed, thuggish behavior, etc., Shaquille O'Neal sends the right message in most cases. He is even liked by the media and often plays around with them. Compare that to the often brooding athlete who can't handle talking to the media to answer questions about hitting or bouncing a ball. Boy, what tough questions to answer! No athlete should ever be viewed as a hero because it simply is not true. They are just men and women who do one particular thing better than most people and that's it. However, with so much media attention focused on these people, it is great to see someone doing the right thing on several fronts. Shaquille O'Neal is a guy most fans can appreciate and look at with respect. Robert Carberry is a freelance writer from New York Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Robert_Carberry http://EzineArticles.com/?Shaquille-ONeal:-Rare-Athlete-To-Respect&id=210774
The story of the Lakers dynasty from 1996 through 2004, when Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O'Neal combined--and collided--to help bring the Lakers three straight championships and restore the franchise as a powerhouse In the history of modern sport, there have never been two high-level teammates who loathed each other the way Shaquille O'Neal loathed Kobe Bryant, and Kobe Bryant loathed Shaquille O'Neal. From public sniping and sparring, to physical altercations and the repeated threats of trade, it was warfare. And yet, despite eight years of infighting and hostility, by turns mediated and encouraged by coach Phil Jackson, the Shaq-Kobe duo resulted in one of the greatest dynasties in NBA history. Together, the two led the Lakers to three straight championships and returned glory and excitement to Los Angeles. In the tradition of Jeff Pearlman's bestsellers Showtime, Boys Will Be Boys, and The Bad Guys Won, Three-Ring Circus is a rollicking deep dive into one of sports' most fraught yet successful pairings. Product DetailsISBN-13: 9781328530004 Media Type: Hardcover Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Publication Date: 09-22-2020 Pages: 448 Product Dimensions: 6.20(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.80(d)About the Author JEFF PEARLMAN is the New York Times bestselling author of ten books. His subjects include the ’80s Los Angeles Lakers (Showtime), the 1986 New York Mets (The Bad Guys Won), the ’90s Dallas Cowboys (Boys Will Be Boys), and NFL legends Walter Payton (Sweetness) and Brett Favre (Gunslinger). HBO adapted Showtime into the dramatic series Winning Time, produced and directed by Adam McKay. A former Sports Illustrated senior writer and ESPN.com columnist, Pearlman is the host of the Two Writers Slinging Yang podcast and blogs regularly at jeffpearlman.com.Table of Contents Table of Contents Author's Note ix Prologue xiii 1 Magic 1 2 The Chosen One 10 3 Kazaam! 36 4 Formation 53 5 Nick the Quick 72 6 Fox Catcher 96 7 Worm Food 121 8 Phil the Void 149 9 Turning Around 174 10 Someone Shoot J.R. 205 11 The Coaching Job 236 12 Kings Without a Crown 251 13 Gettin' Bored with It 273 14 Room 35 294 15 R.A.P.E. 312 16 The Last Season 330 17 Survival 355 18 The End 375 Epilogue 387 Acknowledgments 391 Bibliography 396 Notes 398 Index 414 Show More
Jeff Pearlman talks about "Three-Ring Circus: Kobe, Shaq, Phil, and the Crazy Years of the Lakers Dynasty," which he started writing before Bryant's death.
If I were to start a sports version of Oprah’s book club, Bill Simmons’s The Book of Basketball would top the list...
Shaquille O'Neal when he opens up about Kobe Bryant's death
Detroit DEA Seizes Shaq's Ferrari: The Shaqtastic Shaq Wagon!
The home of all things basketball.
Before LeBron, before Kobe, and before A.I. there was Penny. Michael Jordan himself said that if he was to pass the torch down to anyone it would be Penny Hardaway. But instead Penny never was...
Amidst the breathtaking athleticism and inspirational determination featured in the sports world is an endless array of humorous moments. Sometimes entertaining, other times baffling, these instances subtly shadow the iconic realm of sports...
