March 2
AP
Last Friday, a week shy of his 37th birthday, Shaquille O’Neal abused All-Star big man Chris Bosh and the Toronto Raptors, scoring 45 points on 20 of 25 shooting. Afterward, O’Neal insisted he could do that every night if only he got more touches.
“I think I’m the only player who looks at each and every center,” he said, “and says to myself, ‘That’s barbecued chicken down there.”
Chris Bosh had a slightly different point of view:
Toronto’s Chris Bosh had an explanation for how Shaquille O’Neal scored 45 points: He cheated.“He was just camping down in the lane,” Bosh said Friday night, after O’Neal’s biggest scoring night in six years led Phoenix to a 133-113 victory over the Raptors. “I mean, if they’re not calling three seconds – I thought it was a rule, but I guess not.”
Old age may have slowed his feet a bit, but apparently not his tongue. Shaq responded by comparing his skinnier opponent to the world’s most famous drag queen:
“I heard what Chris Bosh said, and that’s strong words coming from the RuPaul of big men,” O’Neal said. “I’m going to do the same thing (in their next meeting) I did before – make him quit. Make ‘em quit and complain. It’s what I do.”
Then on Sunday, fresh off his physical and verbal assault of Bosh, O’Neal scored 36 points, and led the Suns to an upset over the favored LA Lakers, despite his old arch rival and teammate Kobe Bryant scoring 49.
After the game, a questioner who wondered aloud how the 37 year old is suddenly acting like he’s 25 again. O’Neal responded unfazed, in his legendary monotone delivery:
“It’s what I do. I’ve been doing it since 1992. If you don’t believe it, Google me.”
It is no wonder Shaq mentioned Google because lately, he has been all over the internet. He now has one of the most popular Twitter accounts, originally starting it because someone posted under his name as an impostor. After publicly proving his tweet-legitimacy (and then some) last week, he proclaimed:
Trevor Timm is a Blast Magazine staff writer“To all twitterers , if u c me n public come say hi, we r not the same we r from twitteronia, we connect.”
