“Laughs About Me Bullying Him”: When Candace Parker Claimed Her Arguments With Shaquille O’Neal Transcended TV

Las Vegas Aces’ Candace Parker has had many an argument with basketball legend Shaquille O’Neal. While the two have a genuine bond and friendship that transcends their time together on-screen, they often argue over a range of matters on TNT. Regardless, during an interview with GQ Sports in August 2021, Parker herself talked about her exchanges with Shaq.

Accepting that it makes for entertaining television for the viewers, Parker confessed that she has often been accused of bullying O’Neal.

“I think it’s really funny because we always have those exchanges whether it’s in front of the camera or not. We’re always yelling back and forth. He laughs about me bullying him but I just tell him the truth. I tell him what I think and vice versa,”

she said, claiming that the exchanges are always authentic between the two. 

Parker then claimed that O’Neal tends to authentically lure her into debates. She said that the Lakers legend had texted her only a day before in order to argue about something they had previously talked about. However, while Parker generally has the time to argue with O’Neal, that is not true during this particular incident.

Agreeing to the notion that arguing with O’Neal was like arguing with an uncle, she claimed that their conversations tend to go in circles most of the time. That, judging by the kind of interactions the two end up having on TV, is entirely believable. O’Neal has a habit of finding humor in virtually every situation and never wants to back down. That appears to be true off-screen as well.

Candace Parker once made Shaquille O’Neal walk off set by dunking on him

The hilarious friendship between Shaq and Candace Parker has resulted in a range of memorable moments for viewers. Earlier this year, Parker showed up to the TNT set with a video of her playing NBA 2K with O’Neal.

Using her own character, Parker easily dunked over Shaq, bringing forth a hilarious reaction from the 37-year-old. She said that she had claimed after dunking in the game that Shaq was ‘too little’ and could hardly contain her laughter while telling the story.

The rest of the TNT crew had a similar reaction with Shaquille O’Neal simply unable to muster a response. He ended up silently walking off the set as Parker proceeded to jokingly challenge her for another game. O’Neal refused to answer when asked about the final score, but it was clear for everyone involved that he did not have a good time playing against Parker on NBA 2K.