NBA legend Wilt Chamberlain once revealed his bold take on if Shaquille O’Neal ever faced him in a 1v1 matchup
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Shaquille O’Neal may be known as the lovable teddy bear on ‘Inside the NBA’ with a lot of money now. But back during his hay day, the man was practically the biggest baddest bully in the NBA.
The Diesel stood at 7’1”, had quite a bit of muscle on him, and yet, was unfairly athletic for all that meat on him. Really, it’s almost like god sat up there in the 90s and decided to make the perfect NBA body type for the era.
Wilt Chamberlain wasn’t so bad himself, with the late great sitting several notches higher than O’Neal in the GOAT conversation. So, if we’re being honest, with it all being said and done, it is almost unanimously agreed that Wilt was clearly the better big man.
But, has this always been the verdict? What about during Shaq’s prime, when he looked damn near unstoppable on a nightly basis? Did people look at this debate differently back then?
We don’t have the answer to that, but, we can tell you exactly what Wilt the Stilt had to say on the matter.
Wilt Chamberlain jokes that he would destroy Shaquille O’Neal before giving real reason behind the same statement
When it comes to toughness, there weren’t many, if any, that could be Shaq in his prime. So, by extension you’d believe that strength wouldn’t be his downfall… right?
Well, when Wilt Chamberlain was asked who’d win between the two of them, he clearly had a very different perspective on the matter.
Take a look at the YouTube clip below.
Now, we can’t tell whether Wilt is right or wrong on this one. Frankly, he played so long ago, it seems like any take on him is almost ignorant unless you’ve seen him play live.
All we wish is that a time machine is made so that we could see this matchup without consequences. But of course, since that will probably never happen, it is likely we’ll be forced to never truly know the answer to this one.