Shaq And Chuck Got In A Yelling Match Trying To Make The Same Point

The NBA Playoffs are great for a lot of reasons, but one of them is we get high level basketball every night on national TV. That also comes with the benefit of getting the Inside the NBA crew on our televisions most nights throughout the week, instead of just once on Thursdays.

While it’s great for us, having to interact nightly ratchets up the tension between Charles Barkley and Shaquille O’Neal, as they get on each other’s nerves much quicker than usual because they’re around each other every night. On Thursday, we got our first real Chuck and Shaq blowup of the postseason, and it was one of their dumber arguments in recent memory. Typically, one of them takes a dig at the other, but this time it felt like they both were trying to say the same thing in a slightly different way and just kept getting mad at each other.

In a discussion about the best players coming out and setting the tone, the two started yelling at each other about whether it’s the star’s job to get other players going. Shaq insisted it wasn’t, while Chuck said it was. However, they were really arguing two different things, but got madder and madder with each other.

Chuck’s argument was that the star has to keep the other guys engaged on the court, keeping them in the flow, especially when there’s help being sent at the star. Shaq also noted the star kicks it out when he gets doubled, but thought the argument was about getting guys ready emotionally, insisting that’s on each player to be mentally ready to get going.

As is usually the case, there was not really a common ground found in the two-minute-long argument. Instead, they just dropped it and moved on thinking the other was an idiot when, in truth, I think they mostly agree on this issue and were arguing two different points.