Dirk Nowitzki shared his experience guarding Shaquille O’Neal early in his career on ‘The Big Podcast’. Dirk said that his coach Don Melon came up with a different strategy to guard Shaq, but O’Neal was too physical and dominant to stop. Nothing that they wanted to try would work on the Diesel.
“I’ll never forget, I think it was my second year or something. And Nellie (Don Nelson) came in and was like ‘We’re going to try and guard Shaq a little different today’. And he looks at me and he’s like ‘You’re guarding Shaq’. And I was like ‘What are you…’, I thought he was joking. So he’s like ‘No. As soon as Shaq crosses half-court, you just stand in front of him. And as soon as they throw the ball over, here comes Sean Bradley and then you guys trip him and we’ll be fine. He’s going to pass the ball up’.”
“The first time the ball goes over my head, I turned around, he elbowed Sean out of the way, he elbowed me out of the way, and dunked it so hard. That strategy… it did not work. Obviously, we couldn’t match Shaq’s physicality, so we had to try different stuff to kind of be effective. So, pull him away from the hoop some, maybe run him some in transition, try to pick and roll him to death. But…anything really we tried didn’t work, we couldn’t out-physical him.”
"He elbowed [Shawn Bradley] out of the way, elbowed me out of the way, and dunked it so hard. That strategy did not work."
Dirk Nowitzki on the time he had to guard Shaq 🤣
(via @bigpodwithshaq)pic.twitter.com/rFnExvA9Rw
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPoints) June 9, 2024
Trying to guard O’Neal in his prime was a near-impossible task. And while a young Dirk tried his best to slow down Superman, he wasn’t able to do so. Shaq was so dominant that teams had to plan their defensive schemes around trying to stop his teammates and limit Shaq to the best of their abilities.
Shaquille O’Neal Was Almost Unstoppable In His Prime
Before Game 2 of the NBA Finals, Shaquille O’Neal spoke about Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown. He seemed to suggest that Kobe Bryant was a better player than him during their championship years on the Lakers while trying to tell both players to not focus on who was the better player during this series against the Mavericks.
“Yeah, I think if you’re worried about useless titles… When I was young I was worried about useless titles. But when I stopped worrying about useless titles, I started winning championships In my Laker runs, I was not the best player on the team. I knew that but I knew I was the most dominant.”
“So I knew my role, I knew what I had to do, I wasn’t worried about useless titles. So, if those two young gentlemen are worried about useless titles, who’s the best on the team, whose team it is, it will definitely affect them tonight. Jaylen has been playing well…”
While O’Neal wanting to show respect to his teammate is admirable, he should be more proud of his time with the Lakers. During his three championship runs with the Lakers, Shaq was on another level, averaging 29.9 points, 14.5 rebounds, 3.0 assists, 0.5 steals, and 2.4 blocks in 58 games.
Shaq will always be remembered as the most dominant player in NBA history. His performances with the Lakers are a big reason why his reputation has stayed that way to this day.
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