“Don’t Think Shaquille (O’Neal) Is as Good”: Mad Dog Was Prepared for Shaq’s Disrespect 17 Years Before Heated Outburst on ESPN

Shaquille O’Neal recently threatened Chris “Mad Dog” Russo for blatant disrespect. Russo, while discussing the top 5 greatest centers of all time, put Shaq on #5. To double down on it, he named some players before him that Shaq doesn’t particularly agree with. When the news reached the Big Man, he had no choice but to hit back.

The Shaq hate train, however, is not new for Mad Dog. The radio personality has held this opinion of Shaq for a long time and even talked about the same in his book titled, The Mad Dog Hall of Fame: The Ultimate Top-Ten Rankings of the Best in Sports, which was released almost 17 years ago.

Shaquille O’Neal has always been a subpar athlete for Mad Dog

Russo wrote in his 2006 book, “Now, I don’t think Shaquille is as good, just from an athletic standpoint, as the three centers who are going to be ahead of him on this list-Kareem, Wilt, and Russell.” As per him, Shaq gets away with the tag of one of the greatest centers because of his physical prowess and not his basketball skills. “Physically, obviously, he’s bigger and stronger than any of them, except maybe Wilt. But I don’t think he’s as good an athlete,” he continued. Russo believes that when it comes to the 4x NBA champion, it’s more about the “brute force” than the “basketball delicacy”.

While everyone is entitled to their opinion, Shaq is not one to tolerate disrespect. The recent comment from Russo where he put the Big Man at #5, Shaq sees it as a sign of disrespect. Clapping back at the 64-year-old on a recent episode of his podcast, Shaq said “I will smack the sh*t out of that dude”. The 51-year-old old doesn’t even want to give Russo some time to explain himself, he said, “It’d be just a smack. Anything comes out of his mouth it’d be a [hints at a smack]”. So with the threats, Shaq has to make a case for himself on where he should stand on the top 5 list.

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The Big Man said that he would be happy if he is considered the 3rd best center of all time. Although he did say, “I was going to boastfully and arrogantly say I’m the most dominant center ever. I don’t ever wanna hear another name again”, there are two veterans he won’t mind being put after. Shaq said that he acknowledges Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the pole position holder on the list. He also thinks that Wilt Chamberlain can be put on #2, but only because he has more points than Shaq.

Where would you put Shaq on the top list? Tell us in the comments below.

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