As we know very well, Shaquille O’Neal does not pull any punches when offering his opinion. Especially when he’s speaking of sports. Most especially when he’s talking about his former team, the Los Angeles Lakers. On a recent podcast, O’Neal let fly with some choice words, just in time for the start of this new NBA season.
During the latest episode of his “The Big Podcast with Shaq,” (click that link for the full video version). Shaq took not that as of this writing, the Lakers are – ahem – yet to win a game. Sure, it’s only 0-3, but it’s not been a good start by any stretch of the imagination, and it’s got the Lakers at the very bottom of the Western Division.
On The Big Podcast, O’Neal zeroed in on the Lakers’ troubles – major troubles – from the three-point line. See if you can figure this one out: “They are like Gated Community Gangsters,” said O’Neal of the Lakers. “They ain’t got no shooters.”
So here at the offices of the ShaqFu Radio blog, we had to wonder, what the heck does that mean? We’re guessing the big man means that he personally lives in such a great community… with no crime and no guns. He’s making some kind of corny reference to no crooks… no shooters.
And later in the show, he backed up that idea with a bit more explanation: “They are like a community where I live, they have no shooters. They are like gated community gangsters. They have no shooters in our community. They ain’t go no shooters. They have no shooters. I could leave my door open, I could walk around in my underwear,” Shaq joked.
He continued: “When they get outside the gates they talk hard but inside the gate? they ain’t got no shooters.”
Really, this was supposed to be a bounce-back season for the Lakers after the 2021-22 campaign that – to put not too fine a point on it – saw the purple and gold rack up a pretty terrible record of 33-49.
Honestly this year, it seems the team has simply picked up where they left off last year. Three losses in a row, including getting dumped by the Golden State Warriors and cross-town rivals, the LA Clippers.
Shaq has the stats to back up his negative assessment. In the season opener against Golden State, the Lakers shot an abysmal 10-of-40 from behind the three-point line. They were even worse against the Clippers, putting in just 9 of 45 attempts from behind the arc. Yikes!
LeBron James is technically the best shooter on the roster (with five total triples in those first two games) while the rest of the team has combined to shoot less than 21 percent from distance. Again, those stats are just from the first couple games of the season, and things may have (hopefully!) improved by the time you read this.
Sure, it’s very, very early in the season. The Lakers – and the rest of the NBA – have about 80 more games to go. That makes for plenty of time to find a groove and start draining more shots, from any distance. Hopefully that DIY project is completed sooner rather than later!