Too Big to Fail: Shaquille O’Neal Retires

My first memory of Shaquille O’Neal is linked to a bulky VHS tape that came in the mail when my dad subscribed to Sports Illustrated. The year was 1992 or 1993 and the video captured the year in sports, announcing that the NBA would be forever changed by this seven-foot behemoth as he slid across the floor, on his chest, for a loose ball, his big, black frame moving with all the grace of a celluloid ribbon–he was packed with entertainment.

Remember the 1990′s, when Blockbusters sprouted up in every neighborhood strip mall, right next to the grocery store, making Tom Hanks and Adam Sandler as easily accessible as vegetables and Little Debbie. Parents couldn’t take their kids anywhere without having to feed and entertain them; a trip outside the neighborhood’s cozy confines was to venture through a commercial landmine, a Major Payne if you will. Think carrots dipped in arsenic. Shaq Fu and Kazaam, difficult was the decision of whether or not Shaquille O’Neal was good for us. Even when he was playful and on the rise, he always seemed destined to be a bully. When Michael Jordan retired for the first time, his one and a half years out of the League left Shaquille O’Neal as king of the castle, but the Orlando Shaq never felt legitimate; he was always more Prince John than King Richard, which made Shaquille O’Neal feel like a usurper and most of us rooted against him when the Bulls met his Magic in both the ’95 and ’96 Playoffs. Then Shaq jolted one magic kingdom for another, taking his talents to Venice Beach.

A 6’9″ swingman can switch teams to be with another superstar and is called a coward, but a 7′ center who makes a move to be a movie star casts such a big shadow that even the Hollywood sign comes underneath his shadow and disappears. Because of his size and the Larry O’Brien trophies that gravitated to it, Shaquille O’Neal never played with and was never judged by the same set of rules as every other player in the NBA, so even when he spent the last years of his career hitchhiking, no one said a word about how desperate he had become and just believed that his 330 pounds of talent could squash hay into gold.

But size isn’t the only thing that matters. If Shaq had just been big, he would have been Oliver Miller. He would have bricked himself out of the League, fallen into a deep depression and tried to eat his way out of it. Think Mike Myers as Big Bastard, and that’s Shaquille O’Neal without skill. After his quickness left him, his size allowed him to hold on and wear multiple jerseys, but he was not born from size alone.

"As He Faced the Sun He Cast No Shadow" by Marco Zeppetella

The great irony about Shaquille O’Neal is that his talent always got lost in his own shadow. Refs allowed him to be poked and prodded like a rodeo bull. And for a foul to be a foul on Shaq, the foul had to be twice as hard as it was on everyone else. His footwork was always eclipsed by his power, lost in the soft-crunchy paradigm of a Taco Bell commercial co-starring Hakeem Olajuwon. His size also cost him MVP trophies. For a decade he averaged a minimum of 26 ppg, shooting better than 55% from the field, and hauled down at least 10.7 rpg, going to four Finals in that same ten years, yet he only won one MVP. I don’t know what player from ’94 to ’03 deserves to have his award stripped from him and given to Shaq–the list is a who’s who of all-time greats–but in a game that’s discussions always lead to heated debates over all-time lists and Pantheons, one has to wonder whether or not Shaq’s girth will cost him more than single season awards but his place in the game’s memory, too.

When people mention Kareem, they speak of his cranky rebelliousness and how it was balanced by the grace of his skyhook. When people speak of Wilt, there’s the legend of his sexual prowess and the ease of his 100-point game. When people speak of Russell, they remember the sacrifice of a good soldier. Bill Walton is a talented eccentric, a Renaissance man. David Robinson and Patrick Ewing are twins of toil and commitment. And Hakeem is a Dream. But what is Shaq?

In our collective basketball minds, he was born in the boom of the ’90s, an age of spoiled development and very little sacrifice; then he rode the internet bubble to a three-peat; got bogged down in rivalries and conflicts; and despite being too big to fail, he finally tanked in an age of hope. Judging Shaquille O’Neal is a dangerous act; how does one pigeon hole a Goliath that comes not just with a conquering army but a history too? During the course of his career, Shaq exhibited revolt and dominance, pride and jealousy, humor and contempt, so when we do think of him, perhaps we should remember that no matter how digital our world becomes those same celluloid emotions spin through all our flesh and blood, expanding and condensing, fast forwarding and rewinding, exhaling and inhaling, leaving a body of work ambiguous to measurement.

And whether it comes by way of VHS, DVD, or streaming video, a story is still a story, no matter what size, defined or otherwise.