Shaquille O’Neal is legendary at two things: playing basketball and making up nicknames. Apparently, Shaq is helping Hassan Whiteside with both of those things, the latter of which Whiteside really needs help with.
Now that he’s done competing at WrestleMania 32, Shaq is spending some time mentoring the Miami Heat’s star center. According to The Sun-Sentinel, Whiteside was given Shaq’s number last season, and the two have somewhat of a mentor/mentee relationship.
Whiteside said that he’s able to talk to Shaq whenever he needs to, which gives him a second legendary Heat center that he can talk to if he ever needs guidance – Alonzo Mourning is a member of the team’s front office. But above everything else, Whiteside knows that Shaq’s value lies in his ability to make nicknames for people.
Whiteside said he hopes speaking with O’Neal can lead to something else. Throughout his career, O’Neal had a knack for creating nicknames for himself. They ranged from Superman to Diesel to Big Aristotle. Whiteside is still debating a moniker, even coming up with a short list.
“I need to ask Shaq for a nickname,” Whiteside said. “He’s got 250 nicknames, so that’s the person that should have given me a nickname.”
We’ll let you know what nickname Shaq gives to Whiteside, but based on everything we know about The Diesel, he’ll come up with something great really, really soon.
