Shaq vs Bill Walton: Exploring the Heated Beef Between NBA Hall of Famers That Ignited From NCAA Basketball

Shaquille O’Neal on the Inside the NBA recently said, “In criticism, there is always truth. I stopped getting mad, and I would listen. I was like, ‘You know what, they really give me answers on how to continue to win.” So we can say this is a message from Shaq to the people he has criticized. But he agreed that initially, he would go off on people for criticizing him. One such beef happened with Bill Walton.

Shaq has always considered himself one of the best players ever to step foot in the league. And he was treated the same with the endorsements when he first entered the NBA. In a 1993 commercial with Reebok, he was standing in front of the four legends of the game. It symbolized the passing of the baton toward O’Neal. Yet Shaq always had a problem with the fourth member of that group, i.e., Bill Walton.

On the YouTube channel Secret Base, uploaded the highlights of the beef. With over 1.39 million subscribers on the channel, the video has currently 630k+ views. As per the video, Shaq had some issues with Walton as early as his college basketball days but it only came to light because of his recent comments. In the 2022 podcast, Shaq said, “You know who I’ve always had a problem with? Bill Walton.”

Where did the Beef start?

In the commercial, the other 7ft former athletes were Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. It was O’Neal who came up with the idea.”It was my idea to have legends in the shoot. It was a sign of respect and I made sure they got a nice paycheck for doing the commercial. You’d think it might have led to a relationship or something, but it really didn’t, except for Bill Russell.”

In 2002 O’Neal revealed that he only worked one day with Walton and didn’t learn much from him. He said how Walton focused more on telling stories of war and his style of play and did not help Shaq with any passing techniques. Later Shaq also took a shot at Walton and said he took the best attributes of other big men but not Walton. During that 2002 finals Walton commentated on Shaq’s injury issues which irked the Big Diesel.

The arthritic toe issue that O’Neal was suffering from received advice from many people. One such was Walton who said that Shaq should lose weight to relieve pressure from his toe. Later during the 2002-03 season Shaq met Walton face to face and said,” I ain’t no peon, You better watch your mouth.”

“He talks too much. I’ve done more in this league than he’s done. Tell him he should respect his elders,” this was O’Neal’s response. Even though statically Walton did not have the greatest NBA career, he still was once considered great. His minutes were limited due to multiple injuries he suffered during different times in his career. According to his own admission Walton had undergone 38  orthopedic surgeries to nurse his injuries.

Bill Walton had some strong words for O’Neal

Being in the color commentator role, Walton had strong praise for players for doing well and equally harsh criticism for their bad performance. Shaq once again was struggling to find his form with the Miami Heat in 2008. O’Neal revealed that he had issues with because of an injury. Later he was traded to Phoenix in February where Shaq said he was ready to win another championship.

Walton didn’t understand the sudden change of tune from O’Neal. On SportsCenter, he said it will be difficult for him to adjust and work his way through. In the end, though he added some of the harshest words ever for the 4x NBA champion. “Shaq’s arrogance is an insult to people who think.” And after hearing this Shaq responded by the only way he knows how to.

“I think Mr. Walton has broken the big man pecking order code, ordinance 2257, which means his resume isn’t good enough to speak on what I’ve done,” Shaq said about Walton on ESPN. “I looked at what Mr. Walton has said and one thing that I hate is a hypocrite. So if I’m faking an injury, his whole injury-plagued career is a fake. There’s a guy who only played one or two seasons injury-free, and now he’s talking about me being injured.” 

He ended by explaining what ordinance 2257 was.” Like no big man under should talk about a big man above just not right and it’s just uh disrespectful and I earn my respect.”