In the hit TV show Winning Time, Jerry West was characterized as an anxious, obsessive ball of nerves whose extreme reactions were matched only by his care for winning basketball games. Between handfuls of antacids, West spent the duration of the show ping-ponging between a depressive spiral and the peaks of winning elation. While West found the portrayal disrespectful and untrue, there was some truth to it as seen in West’s pursuit of Shaquille O’Neal in 1996.
Advertisement
Despite what the rest of his post-career life would say, Shaq insists that his priorities in life and in basketball did not stem from money. Every NBA player becomes a millionaire the second they are drafted. League minimum salary for a player with zero years of NBA experience is just over $1.1 million.
To take every amount of money available to you is not evil or stupid. It is normal. To monetize your passions is simultaneously a dream and a curse, and Shaq detailed how he got around that.
“When you have the love and passion to do something, you take everything that comes with it – good and bad. I would have played basketball for $120,000 for 7 years rather than $120 million, because I loved to play basketball,” stated Shaq.
“Yes, there was a lot that came with the game – the commercials, all of that. I focused on playing basketball because I loved the game and everything that came with it,” Shaq continued. “I never said to myself that I would only play basketball if they pay me $100 million – I played basketball because I loved basketball.“
As true as this might be — and it very well could be because Shaq very clearly loved playing basketball — the big man also very clearly valued his financial compensation. Despite claiming he’d take $120,000 for seven years, Shaq himself fueled the bidding war between the Orlando Magic and Los Angeles Lakers, eventually pushing for that record-setting $120 million deal.
These negotiations got so insane that Jerry West had to be hospitalized. Between the pursuit of O’Neal and trade negotiations chasing teenager Kobe Bryant before the draft, West’s AFib, or atrial fibrillation, got bad enough that he needed serious medical attention. But he got both players.
Years later, Shaq’s would take a paycut to chase a title with the Miami Heat. It was Pat Riley’s pleas (funny enough, another character in Winning Time) that convinced the big man to take the cut that, and it paid off with a title in 2006. While Riley was West’s protege as a coach before moving to Miami, the two were far too competitive to congratulate each other.
