SHAQ’S MVP RANT REEKS OF JEALOUSY
Once again, Jokic fails to get the respect that he deserves, writes
The league’s threetime most valuable player had to sit there and take it. Although he was deemed worthy of receiving the NBA’S most prestigious individual award this season, joining the pantheon of legends who have won it at least three times and surpassing even the ex-pro who once crowned himself the “most dominant ever,” Denver Nuggets centre Nikola Jokic had to sit there and take the disrespect.
Jokic isn’t simply a master of advanced metrics with his array of fundamentals, befuddling the competition in a league flush with more athletic players. Jokic is an object of envy and target of contempt. He is an outsider, the prisoner of an argument that begins with “yeah, but ...” and ends with a backhanded compliment that feels more like a two-by-four.
Maybe Shaquille O’neal, the hall of famer who last appeared in an NBA game at a time when centres viewed the three-point arc as the badlands, thought he was being honest when he told Jokic someone else deserved the honour. In a warped world where sharing my truth upstages even sparing a morsel of consideration for someone else, then yes, O’neal was just keepin’ it a hundred. In reality, O’neal belittled Jokic to his face and headlined the latest viral gag on TNT’S Inside the NBA set: a 7-foot-1 former great contorting himself into a spot on stage for the world’s pettiest debate.
On Wednesday night, after the results of the MVP voting were broadcast live on TNT, O’neal smacked his lips, then began a monologue stacked with antiquated logic and too many contradictions to keep count.
“I don’t like to rain on people’s parade,” said O’neal, just before sending a monsoon on Jokic’s, “but I’m not happy with this one.”
O’neal continued as the rest of the crew listened in rapt silence — or possibly, utter disbelief.
“Congratulations to Joker, you are the best big man in the league. But based on everybody’s criteria, my criteria, stat-stuffer, you guys’ criteria, No. 1 seed, which team has the better record, I felt Shai Alexander deserved it,” O’neal said, initially flubbing the name of the player he was praising. Shai Gilgeous-alexander of the Oklahoma City Thunder finished second in the voting. Jokic received more than five times as many first-place votes as Hamilton’s Gilgeous-alexander, so the voters’ criteria were vastly different from O’neal’s.
Although OKC earned the top seed in the Western Conference, the Thunder and the Nuggets finished the regular season with identical 57-25 records. As far as stat stuffing goes, Jokic recorded 25 triple-doubles (one off the league leader, Domantas Sabonis of the Sacramento Kings) and ruled over everyone in those nerdy categories like player efficiency rating, win shares and value over replacement player.
Not only did Jokic lead his team, the reigning NBA champion, to wins, but in many ways, he matched or eclipsed his individual numbers from his first MVP campaign in 2020-21. So, Shaq’s claims about team impact and stuffing the stat sheet would only hold up in a one-sided rant, not a debate. However, the true reason for his protest seems to be more personal — as it tends to be with the guardians of the game who prefer their NBA served with a side of ’90s nostalgia, the retired guys who can’t stop reminding everyone about their own primes.
“I’ve been No. 2 a lot. And I played my a-- off,” O’neal said, finally getting to the truth behind his pick. “The fact that (Gilgeous-alexander) has to start all over next year and try to win it again, I know that’s going to be hurtful for him. Hopefully, he uses this to motivate him to win a championship. But I thought — and again, no disrespect to the Joker ... ”
When anyone prefaces a statement with the words “no disrespect,” just know a deluge of disrespect is intended. After host Ernie Johnson countered several of O’neal’s claims, the big man just repeated himself, stating how Gilgeous-alexander was one of the few players this season who scored 30 points 50 times, in a season defined by its historically high scoring rate. Thirdplace MVP finisher Luka Doncic actually led the league with 33.9 points per game.
When the time came for Jokic to join the crew and accept his flowers on live television, it looked as though the team had found the nearest coat closet inside Denver’s Ball Arena where he could conduct an interview over a 3G network. The low-key setup, however, was classic Jokic.
His boredom with greatness doesn’t just come across as sincere, but refreshing.
Though that’s indeed him starring in a national ad campaign about hotels, with little-known teammate Peyton Watson setting up Jokic’s deadpan delivery, he isn’t searching for the spotlight. Besides the number of MVPS Jokic now possesses (compared with O’neal’s one), the biggest difference between the two celebrated centres is that Jokic would never say yes to starring in the film Kazaam.
His indifference to fame and recognition might have been just one of the reasons Jokic could sit inside a room — appearing slightly out of focus, accompanied by a strange beeping noise — and take Shaq’s verbal slap to his face.
“Joker, as the president of the big man alliance: You are the vice-president of the big man alliance,” O’neal said while
Jokic, on the right side of a split screen, could be seen humouring him by lowering his head, holding the bridge of his nose while smiling.
“You know I love you, the best player in the league. I want to congratulate you, but I want you to hear it from me first: I thought that SGA should’ve been the MVP, that’s no disrespect to you. But congratulations. And what do you guys have to do to get back on track versus Minnesota?” O’neal said.
Instead of taking his turn to congratulate a fellow MVP, O’neal had to exert superiority over Jokic — a made-up president addressing his imaginary veep.
If anything could close the debate over Jokic’s status as the NBA’S best player, a third MVP should have done so. However, O’neal was likely speaking up for so many other skeptics. Their motivations may vary, yet their unity lies in the belief that Jokic should not be the face of a league that has produced icons such as Kareem Abdul-jabbar, Michael Jordan and Larry Bird.
No disrespect, but the opinion reeks of jealousy and screams of superficiality. The best big man, as well as the best player in the NBA, deserves the acclaim without the asterisks.