It’s not exactly rare to fear prime Shaq. More than a few NBA players dreaded the thought of battling 7’1″, 325 pounds of unstoppable force draped in Purple & Gold. Shaquille O’Neal was, for some, a walking trauma — even for the league’s toughest stars.

What many don’t realize is that the fear went beyond the hardwood. It even seeped into Hollywood. The Big Aristotle wasn’t just the main event that drew celebrities courtside to the old Staples Center — sometimes, he terrorized those same celebrities.

One of them? Eddie Murphy. Yes, the very comedic legend who inspired Shaq’s Hollywood ambitions. In a recent chat with Speedy Morman, the 64-year-old actor opened up about his new movie The Pickup — and about those unforgettable nights sitting courtside at Lakers games.

Now Murphy is a self-proclaimed homebody. So it’s a big deal that the Lakers are able to draw him out for games frequently. Yet, every time he’s at one of these games, he’s putting his mental state at risk. “I have a a greatest fear of at the basketball,” he told Morman.

He denied it’s about getting in the face with a basketball which has happened to him (nothing to do with the famous ‘In da face’ scene from Coming to America). “I have one of these giant motherf—–s coming and going for a ball and run you over and s–t.”

In the early ’00s, Murphy was attending Lakers games as a real fan and a lot of fear. “You be on TV and they be on the news and Shaq stepping on your face or whenever I go there ‘cuz you realize how big these guys are till you sit on the floor and they run by. It’s like a f—–g herd like seven feet dude they be diving and sh– and my biggest fear is to be sitting there and one of them guys go dive for some ball … knock me out and turn into some meme and s–t.”

Understandable. Back in the day, Shaq had the tendency to forget he’s massive when he used to dive into the stands to save a ball. There’s a legendary incident from 1998 when O’Neal flew over the Lakers bench and fell headfirst into the stands. His teammates ducked but funnily enough a young Kobe Bryant barely flinched at 300+lbs flying over him.

Even when he was slower and bigger in Phoenix, he provided enough content for a highlight reel of him tumbling into the stands. NBA players had the reflexes to duck and clear out. Regular folks nearly got the full weight of Big Diesel. No history of Eddie Murphy experiencing that but witnessing it was enough.

Eddie Murphy saved Shaquille O’Neal’s career

Despite developing a phobia of Shaq, Eddie Murphy and the big guy are actually pretty cool. Shaquille O’Neal’s Hollywood dreams are even closely connected to Dr Dolittle.

When Kazaam was a box office bomb in 1996, everyone thought this was the end of Shaq’s acting career right after he moved to Los Angeles. “I saw Eddie Murphy walk into a restaurant in all leather. All fu—– leather. Being in Los Angeles taught you how to be a superstar. I saw the stars in L.A. and thought, this is what I want!’” Shaq said in the book Three Ring Circus.

Shaq would stick to acting, have cameos in Adam Sandler’s movies, and he’s soon making a serious acting comeback on the Prime series, Gravesend. Before we see him as a New York crimelord, he actually attempted to replace Murphy.

O’Neal auditioned for the role of Axel Foley in the fourth Beverly Hills Cop movie that released on Netflix in 2024. He even took a dig at Kazaam while he was at it. But there’s no replacing Eddie just as the actor is not going to clear out benches while chasing a ball.