by Marcel Mutoni / @marcel_mutoni
Shaquille O’Neal, in his role as television analyst, continues to push forward his silly idea that Dwight Howard is anything but the NBA’s best center. O’Neal — who has a confounding history of belittling Howard at virtually every opportunity he gets — contends that Andrew Bynum and Brook Lopez are better, truer big men.
Dwight Howard was asked about this yesterday following practice, and the Lakers’ center let it be known that O’Neal needs to move on, and that Howard hopes to be a different (more positive) voice once he retires from the game.
Per the LA Daily News and OC Register:
“I don’t care what Shaq says,” Howard said of the former Lakers center, who also moved from Orlando to Los Angeles amid much teeth gnashing in central Florida. “Shaq played the game. He’s done. He’s gone. It’s time to move on. He hated the fact when he played that the older guys were talking about him and how he played and now he’s doing the exact same thing,” Howard said of O’Neal. “Just let it go. There’s no sense for him to be talking trash to me. He did his thing in the league. He’s one of the most dominant players to ever play the game. Just sit back and relax. You did your thing. Your time is up. So, I don’t really care. He can say whatever he wants to say.”
“I have respect for him and what he did for basketball. That’s it. Like I said, he has already did his thing. He played. When my time is up, there’s going to be somebody else who can do everything I can do and probably do it better. Instead of me talking about him, I’ll do my job to try to help him get to where I’m at. I think that’s what guys who have done it before us should do.”
It’s unlikely that Shaquille O’Neal will do anything but talk even more trash going forward, and the sooner Dwight Howard realizes that (and ignores it), the better off he’ll be.
As for Andrew Bynum and Brook Lopez, they will have plenty of opportunities to prove their worth once the season begins.
