Shaquille O’Neal, Once Suspended and Fined for Punching Opponent, Issues Softer Sentence for Draymond Green

During his time in the NBA, Shaquille O’Neal was ejected 14 times in his career, making him 6th on the all-time ejections list. But as the game has changed drastically in recent years, players have not put themselves in such situations as often. That is, players not named Draymond Green. The 2017 DPOY has been suspended for the second time in one month. He has the most ejections amongst active players, and is second on the all-time list with 19.

Green was previously suspended 5 days for putting Rudy Gobert in a chokehold. This time, Draymond faces an indefinite suspension as the league decides on next steps. While the entire media is assuming Green’s suspension will last an extended period, the Los Angeles Lakers legend recently went against the tide of public opinion.

Shaquille O’Neal advocates for Draymond Green to return soon

O’Neal recently joined TMZ to talk about the Draymond Green suspension. While the number of days of his suspension has still not been determined, the NBA announced that Green is suspended ‘indefinitely’ following his on-court incident with Jusuf Nurkić. Green’s fist landed on Nurkić’s face during Golden State’s 119-116 loss against the Phoenix Suns.

As the NBA world is left in suspense with no clear-cut timeline for Green’s return to the court, O’Neal revealed that if he were the NBA commissioner, Green would only get 2 games. Interestingly, Shaq agrees with Draymond’s post-match comment that the ‘punch’ was unintentional.

“I think he definitely was trying to sell the call. I think the mistake that he made is he had his arms out extended“, explained Shaquille O’Neal.

Currently, the NBA and the Golden State Warriors are working with Green to meet certain expectations and conditions put forward by the league. Only once he has cleared those will he be allowed to return to action. While it can seem like a lot to ask, reports recently came out that Green has acknowledged that he needs help to fix his issues and has started working towards the same.

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Having faced multiple suspensions for physical altercations on the court, Shaquille O’Neal sees this as just another instance of reckless behavior, but the NBA is not looking at it that way. Notably, Big Diesel played in a different time. And he was a menace too.

Are Shaq and Draymond in the same category?

In January 2002, the 4x NBA champion threw a full punch at Bulls‘ big, Brad Miller, for repeatedly fouling him. At that time, Shaq received a 3-game suspension and was fined $15,000. This was years after he had already received a suspension for slapping an opponent during a shootaround.

While Green did not go to such an extreme and throw a direct punch at someone (at least, in-game), his suspension has more to it than just the interaction on the court. While the offense against Nurkic is one incident, the NBA is not tolerating repeated offenses even after getting a prior warning.

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One example of this is Ja Morant, who was suspended 25 games this season because he failed to keep his word after the NBA had already expressed their concerns about him. With Green now in a similar boat, only time will tell when he will be allowed to return to the Warriors and help his team.