Known as one of the biggest pranksters in NBA history, it’s usually pretty easy for Shaquille O’Neal to get a laugh. Even when he’s not trying to, he has such great moments like when his foot got tied up on the set of Inside the NBA and he went sprawling on the floor, there seems to be a rule that wherever the Big Diesel goes, laughs follow. That’s not always the case though, as he got hilariously stonewalled by Dwyane Wade’s 16-month-old daughter during the COVID pandemic.
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Just as most of the world was, Shaq and the rest of the Inside the NBA crew were all working remotely at that point. During one broadcast, they got to meet Kaavia, D-Wade’s daughter, after his wife Gabrielle Union brought her in to sit with her dad.
Shaq was once Wade’s teammate with the Miami Heat, and they won an NBA title together. It seems their good chemistry wasn’t passed down from father to daughter though, because when Shaq tried to get Kaavia to laugh, he failed miserably.
Candace Parker tried to get Kaavia’s attention first, and she succeeded at getting a smile out of her with an energetic rendition of everyone’s favorite earworm, Baby Shark. Maybe it worked because she changed the lyrics at one point to “Shaq shark,” and Kaavia, taking note of the 7-foot-1 monster staring at her on the screen, found it fitting.
Shaq was up next, and despite his best efforts, it didn’t go well. “Kaavia, my name is Uncle Shaqy,” he said as he shook his head from side to side. “I’m gonna kiss you on your cheeky,” he continued, before launching into a kissy-faced round of gibberish that got Parker, Wade and Adam Lefkoe to crack up. Kaavia, though, was unimpressed, and she stared at Shaq with a straight face as if to say, “Are you done yet?”
The last time Shaq failed this badly to impress an audience was when Kazaam and Steel came out in back-to-back years in the mid-’90s.
Shaq shouldn’t feel too badly about Kaavia giving him the cold shoulder, because since that time, the little one has gained a reputation for having the look of a stone cold killer. Dubbed “Shady Baby,” the youngest Wade was once described by her mom during an interview with Ellen Degeneres as “unbothered and unimpressed” at all times.
The Wades even wrote a best-selling Shady Baby book that was inspired by Kaavia’s unique personality, and she’s gone on to gain over 1.8 million Instagram followers with her stern looks.
