A very easy way to get people riled up is to put out any sort of ranking of basketball players, which will invariably include one or two things that get social media buzzing. Every now and then, a player will opine on said ranking — ex: Jamal Murray recently calling out something Nick Wright said about where Nikola Jokic would rank among MVP winners — and on incredibly rare occasions, we get one of the dudes involved in said ranking voicing their discontent.
That last thing happened recently when Shaquille O’Neal was made aware of a tiered ranking of players who suited up for the Los Angeles Lakers based on the impact they had with the team. He noticed that he was one step below the top tier — Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Kobe Bryant, Magic Johnson — and placed on par with LeBron James and Jerry West, which he did not particularly appreciate.
“I do not agree, hell no,” Shaq wrote.
Shaq is very much someone who has strong reactions whenever his greatness as a player is questioned, so it probably isn’t a big surprise that he wasn’t happy when he saw this. Still, he has a point that if you’re going by impact as a Laker, putting him anywhere other than at the very top is incorrect.
