Yet another story of our man Shaq and his good deeds to friends, and sometimes even strangers. In this particular case, the story comes from a book on the glory days of the Los Angeles Lakers.
In his book Three-Ring Circus: Kobe, Shaq, Phil and the Crazy Years of the Lakers Dynasty, former Lakers player Mike Penberthy talks of O’Neal as a “big brother with a big bank account.” Penberthy was with the Lakers during that major Championship-winning run. Today, he’s in the front office of the Denver Nuggets.
As big, tough, strong and dominating as he was on the court, Penberthy says O’Neal was – for him and some other teammates – the complete opposite off the court.
As for Penberthy.. He was a part of the 1997 NBA Draft Class, although technically, he was undrafted. He’d played college ball at little-known Master’s College in Santa Clarita, California, and enjoyed a bit of success in the CBA and in overseas play.
Penberthy officially joined the Lakers in 2000 and eventually went on to a career of 56 games for the purple and gold. He earned his ring as part of the Lakers’ championship team in 2000-01. After that, he went on to become a shooting coach with several teams, and a full-on assistant coach with the Lakers…eventually landing in Denver.
In the book, Penberthy writes about his first days with the Lakers. When he originally arrived for his first week of work, he was apparently wearing what he described as a “Banana Republic suit jacket.” Shaq took notice, and asked if he had any other suits. When Penberthy said no, the pair went for a visit to O’Neal’s personal tailor. Shaq paid for six new suits!
Later, when Penberthy’s father passed away, O’Neal was there again, offering to pay for the father’s funeral.
Penberthy isn’t the only Lakers player of the time with stories of O’Neal’s big brother / big bank account status. Former Lakers forward Mark Madsen, with the team from 2000-2003, has talked about how O’Neal took him to a car dealership and made the down payment on a brand-new Chevrolet Tahoe Madsen wanted.
Like Penberthy, Madsen has similar stories of Shaq opening his wallet for clothing and more. When Shaq took him to a local jeweler’s and bought him a Rolex watch, that was pretty cool. Then he found out O’Neal had bought similar watches for the entire Lakers team!
Stories of Shaq’s generosity are to be found all over the internet. Dig into this here ShaqFu Radio blog for even more cool stories about “the big brother with the big bank account.”