“OGs Gotta Stop Saying That They’ll Just Average 40”: Shaquille O’Neal’s Claims About His Dominance Irk Lou Williams

There hasn’t been any player or legend who has come forward claiming they could go toe-to-toe with Shaquille O’Neal in his prime. Arguably the most dominant center to grace the game of basketball, Shaq’s latest response didn’t sit well with the former Sixth Man of the Year. Claiming he’d average 40 points in today’s NBA, Shaq’s statement gets scrutinized by Lou Williams and another former NBA player.

Lou Williams recently gave his two cents on Shaquille O’Neal’s claim on the Run It Back Podcast. Joined by another former NBA player, Chandler Parsons, Williams expressed his disagreement with Shaq’s take.

“I’m not buying it… I think our OG’s gotta stop saying that they’ll just average 40 points a game off the whim.”

Lou Williams gave Shaquille O’Neal his flowers as being one of the most dominant players, who would go on to be successful in any given era. However, he also went on to bring in a couple of other factors as well.

Williams mentioned how Shaq would be hacked much more in today’s era of basketball, given how poor his free-throw shooting was throughout his career. Another factor he brought in was the type of players he would be going up against.

The 17-year veteran guard mentioned players like Karl-Anthony Towns, Victor Wembanyama, and Dirk Nowitzki as a few examples of the matchups Shaq would go out on the perimeter to defend.

Most importantly, Williams mentioned how the game has transitioned from putting the ball on the block and letting players like Shaq go to work in the post to stretching the floor instead and valuing the three-ball more than those two points.

Shaquille O’Neal’s previous claims regarding today’s NBA

Shaquille O’Neal claimed he could easily average 40 points in the league when asked by NFL star Micah Parsons at Game 4 of the Mavericks-Timberwolves matchup. But only a few months ago, Shaq claimed he’d average not 40 but 60 points instead.

This is a trend many NBA legends from the 80s and 90s have followed, where they claim the current league is soft and they would average extravagant numbers in today’s NBA as opposed to the stats they had back then.

And Shaq not only believed he could average such big numbers but as per SlamOnline, O’Neal had also claimed that Michael Jordan would easily go on to average 45 points in the league today.

“He would average 45 [points], and the League would be complaining about two players. They’d be like, Mike is too good. And the kid down in Orlando is too dominant. What are we going to do?”

And it’s not just the Los Angeles Lakers legend but Wilt Chamberlain had somewhat of the same answer when he was asked how many points would he go on to average in the current NBA.

Whether these players would go on to put up such huge averages or not, it is interesting to see how former NBA legends have always belittled the playing style of current stars in the league as opposed to their playing days.