Shaquille O’Neal always had a flair for the theatrical and his first game against Orlando was no different. The ‘Big Aristotle’ left the city that drafted him after a mere 4 years spent with them to chase championships with the most storied franchise in NBA history: the Los Angeles Lakers. Reflecting on that first encounter with the Magic as a Laker, Shaq brings forth an interesting goal of his for that 1996-97 season.
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On the Orlando Magic’s YouTube account, Shaq sat down with former Magic player Dennis Scott to talk about how he felt playing against Orlando for the first time after leaving the Magic. O’Neal’s free agency move in the summer of ’96 was one of the biggest across league history so there certainly was bad blood between him and Magic fans.
Shaq’s aim for that night, however, was to drum up even more interest than there already was. He told Scott that he purposefully let it be known that he didn’t like Penny Hardaway and Nick Anderson, his former teammates, to drum up more buzz and interest.
“I have to market the game to where we hate each other. Because I want people to watch. ‘Shaq what’s the news?’ ‘Oh I hate Penny, I ain’t talking to Penny. He dogged me out.’ ‘What about Nick?’ ‘I ain’t talking to Nick either.’ I had to get people to think. So now when I get boo’d, I was like ‘It worked’.”
This isn’t surprising as Shaq once stated on the Full Send podcast that he overexaggerated his beef with Kobe Bryant as well so as to keep his name floating around in the media. Essentially, he wanted to stay relevant at all times and given his personality, it certainly played out that way.
This Lakers-Magic bout took place on December 6th, 1996 where the latter visited the purple and gold in LA. Shaq dropped 25 points on 9-18 shooting from the field in a comfortable 92-81 victory, as per Basketball Reference. Their second meeting was a bit different as Shaq did not play in this game in Orlando and the Lakers were ran out of the building in a 110-84 loss.
Shaquille O’Neal and Penny Hardaway have since made up
Shaq and Penny were slated as being the NBA’s next greatest one-tow punch with a perfect balance of scoring from the inside and applying pressure from away the basket. They would even make the NBA Finals in their 2nd year as a tandem and while they did get swept by Hakeem’s Rockets, it was a testament to their seemingly infinite potential.
Unfortunately, Shaq’s youthful mentality of wanting to be the alpha got in the way. Hardaway, being the ever competitor that he was, felt similarly. The 4x NBA champion has since let it be known publicly that it was his ego that led to him leaving Penny and the Magic and expresses a certain level of remorse over how things unfolded.
“Big mistake in the Penny relationship. Big mistake in the Kobe relationship… I was arrogant, I was dumb, but sometimes when you do a lot of stuff you don’t wanna work at stuff. Those [are] the only three major regrets that I have.”
Since then the two seem to have put their past differences aside as Penny was present for Shaq’s Magic jersey retirement. The former All-Star guard congratulated O’Neal for the achievement and the two exchanged a myriad of compliments so it’s safe to say they have buried the hatchet.
