The man upstairs was perhaps a bit late to save Shaquille O’Neal. He is already accused of never having helped the 4x NBA champ improve his one flaw. Besides God, O’Neal has also blamed a few other non-living things for his inefficiency in this particular domain. And no one seemed to come to Shaq’s rescue as his frenemy Charles Barkley took a cheeky shot at the Lakers legend while teasing his Grammy Awardee guest.

We would have loved to see how Shaq would have reacted if he were present in the latest episode of The Steam Room podcast. Co-hosts Chuck and Ernie Johnson welcomed singers Dan Smyers and Shay Mooney, popularly known as Dan + Shay, who joined the duo on the big screen in the room. Among many things, Dan shared his interest in basketball but also emphasized his struggles with free throws.

Just as he mentioned the things he’s good at on the basketball court, he also revealed that he struggles big time with free throws. “I don’t have it in me. I’m good in the paint, I can bang people around a little bit, play a little defense. The stroke is not it, though, man. From the free throw line, I’m 10% if I’m lucky.” This last bit immediately incited a reaction from Ernie, who said, “Shaq would say that’s good.“

And Chuck just had to follow up on that comment. “Yeah, Shaq would say that you in the zone,” Barkley said on the podcast, as the country music duo burst out into laughter. The Big Aristotle has the 5th worst free-throw percentage in NBA history, shooting 52.7% from the line in regular-season games. He missed 5,317 of his 11,252 free-throw attempts.

It got even worse in the playoffs, where he shot 50.4% on 10.7 attempts per game. He made just 1,168 out of 2,317 from the line. He had to specifically work on his free throws in 1995 to defeat the Bulls. There’s even a strategy called Hack-a-Shaq, inspired by the Los Angeles Lakers legend, which teams use to save time.

So, naturally, Chuck didn’t hesitate to tease O’Neal. Chuck and Kenny Smith often tease him about his poor free-throwing skills on Inside the NBA as well. Now, moving on to Shaq, is he fine with it?

Shaquille O’Neal reveals the reason behind his poor free throw shooting

The basketball legend struggled with his free throws for much of his career. Some speculated that it could be because of his big hands. And at one point, he even blamed the ball itself for his challenges.

“I don’t know why I shot like that…I hope people don’t take this the wrong way. I hated the dark-skinned ball. Just don’t worry about how it sounds,” Shaquille O’Neal argued in The Big Podcast. Regardless of the reason, the 15x NBA All-Star seems to have come to terms with it.

He believes that God never let him excel at free throws to keep him humble. “Let me tell you something. This is just god’s way of keeping me humble,” O’Neal once said. Fair enough. Fixing this aspect of his game would have been a major game-changer. But what’s remarkable is how, despite his flaws, O’Neal found so much success in the league.