Shaquille O’Neal is one of the funniest superstars the NBA has ever seen. At the very top of the game, personalities tend to be quite similar. However, despite being arguably a Top 10 player of all time, Shaquille O’Neal has a larger-than-life personality. Not only is Shaq a businessman, but he is also a philanthropist, a police officer, a rapper, and, most interestingly, a DJ.
Shaq has legendary party scenes even at the age of 50, and his DJ nights are enjoyed by partygoers across the world. He recently partied so hard in Eastern Europe that Luka Doncic seemingly had trouble hearing after being on stage with him. So it’s hard to imagine that for much of his life, O’Neal was repulsed by the smell of alcohol. But that’s exactly what it was like for much of his life, as he told Vanity Fair in 2012.
“Actually, my father caught me sipping a beer with my cousins when I was, like, 13. So he made me drink a 12-pack right then. Not only did I get drunk, I hated beer, and I never had the urge to drink again.”
Shaq was raised by Phillip Harrison, an Army Sargeant, who was his stepfather. Harrison had a great influence on the legendary big man’s life, including how he played. He explained in another interview how his father wanted him to dunk more and stop playing like Magic Johnson.
At a different point, when O’Neal was feeling the pressure of playing in the NBA, his father showed him a homeless family to give him some perspective on the problems that people face in this world. It’s safe to say that Shaq was raised by a man that wanted him to understand the fundamentals of respect and consequences.
His aversion to alcohol seems to have gone away in recent years, though businessman Shaq has fully blossomed in his later years. O’Neal has a brand of vodka called Luv Shaq, with the big man taking a piece of the $35 billion vodka industry. While it may not be the best way to stop a young man from drinking, it seems that Shaq’s father’s influence on him has made a huge difference in his life.
