On his Instagram, Shaquille O’Neal shared a story about Kyrie Irving never receiving a single top-five MVP place vote in his career. He shared a clip by ‘hoops.empire’ which delved into the disrespect towards Kai by citing examples of others who have received MVP votes in the last few years. The narrator in the video also cited Ben Simmons’ example who received a few MVP votes during the 2020-21 season.
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In that season, Simmons put up 14.3 points, 7.2 rebounds, 6.9 assists, and 1.6 steals per game. He was named to the first All-Defensive team and was a bonafide two-way star. However, the narrator alluded that later in the playoffs, the former 76ers star had “forgotten to play basketball”.
He took shots at Simmons’ calamitous performances against the Hawks in the 2021 first round. Then, he referred to Rudy Gobert, who has drawn MVP votes “through multiple years”, despite not having a sustainable offensive game.
Other examples involved Victor Oladipo, Goran Dragic, Mike Conley, the Pistons version of Derrick Rose, Ty Lawson, Stephen Jackson, Jalen Rose, and PJ Brown. At the end of the video, the narrator urged voters to give at least one MVP vote to Kai this year. He has a point considering the Mavs guard has been one of the best scorers to play the game. He has consistently hit over 20 points a game and has been highly efficient compared to many others.
During the 2017-18 season, the dribbling wizard scooped out 24.4 points, 5.1 assists, 3.8 rebounds, and 1.1 steals, per game with 49.1% shooting. He helped his Boston Celtics to a 55-27 record and second seed in the Eastern Conference. Despite these heroics, he shockingly missed out on MVP votes. The fact that athletes like Dragic and Lawson, who have never been as effective as Irving, have gotten more MVP votes seemed to have troubled Shaq who put up the story regarding the same.
However, O’Neal has not always been kind to the 8x All-Star. Considering the former Nets guard’s never-ending off-the-court controversies, Shaq has ripped into him on multiple occasions.
Shaquille O’Neal has called Kyrie Irving an idiot
The Mavs point guard has repeatedly drawn flak from NBA legends. The criticism peaked when he refused to get vaccinated during the COVID-19 phase, despite a vaccine mandate in New York. Thus, he missed all home games for the squad. Then, things took a turn for worse when he ended up tweeting a link to a movie that was labeled as “antisemitic”.
Shaquille O’Neal disapproved of this tweet and called Kyrie Irving an idiot. He accused Kai of fomenting discord through his actions,
“The game we used to love, and we promote it brings people together. And it hurts me sometimes when we have to sit up here to talk about stuff that divides the game. Now we got to answer for what this idiot has done.”
While Shaq has lambasted Irving for his “divisive” actions, the reasons have been mainly non-hoops. When it comes to balling, the 3x Finals MVP knows what Kai is all about.
