It’s been a long time since Shaquille O’Neal played professional basketball, and in that time, an entire generation has come to know him more as a commentator than as a 4 time NBA champion. Shaq was truly dominant, a player so physically overwhelming that the only way most teams could stop him was to foul him.
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Shaq always had the athletic gifts to be great, but then again, lots of athletes have superior physical tools. Not all of them put them to good use because they don’t have the drive and the mental game to match.
Athletic greatness doesn’t happen without real motivation, and that can come in many forms. On the newest episode of his podcast, Shaq sat down with fellow legend Tom Brady for a wide-ranging discussion that included him talking about where his motivation to be great came from.
“Who pushed you when you were young?” Brady asked, to which Shaq responded, “My dad was super hard [on me]. A military drill sergeant, and he wanted perfection.”
Shaq recalled a game in high school where his team was winning by 50 or 60 through the first three quarters, and he had 45 himself. “I’m not dunking. I’m 6’11” but I’m still not dunking because I’m smooth,” he said. “So I lay it up, finger roll, and miss. He comes on the court and calls a timeout.”
“He wasn’t the coach, by the way,” Adam Lefkoe helpfully chimed in.
“Took me outside, smacked the s*** out of me,” Shaq said. “He said, ‘What are you doing?’ I said, ‘I’m working on my Magic Johnson.'” Shaq’s dad smacked him again.
“‘F*** Magic Johnson, you need to be Shaq.’ So that’s when I started dunking, and every time I dunk I wanted to tear the rim off ’cause I was mad at him,” the former Lakers star recalled.
Obviously these days, this isn’t a parenting style that would fly, but it had its intended effect. “The most valuable thing I got out of that lesson is to never be complacent, on to the next,” Shaq said before describing how he would play in tournaments as a kid and get a trophy on Saturday for winning the championship.
His dad always wanted him pushing towards the next thing, so “Sunday, trophies be gone.”
Once he got to the pros, Shaq used jealousy to motivate him. “I would see things I didn’t have, and it would drive me crazy,” he said. “When I first came in the league, everybody was on Magic and Jordan and Barkley, and I’m like, ‘F*** them, this is gonna be my league one day,’ so it just motivated me more.”
Whatever he did, it obviously worked, as he went on to have one of the greatest careers in NBA history. Sitting across from Brady only highlighted how there are many paths to greatness, but the best of the best find whichever one works for them and take it.
