Shaquille O’Neal Misses ‘Opportunity of a Lifetime’ in Fleeting Elevator Interaction

Shaquille O’Neal rarely lets opportunities fly by. On this occasion, however, he was on and about his business, roaming random buildings, avoiding the stairs, and he came across Jimmy. No, not Jimmy Butler. It’s The Jimmy. Or known to his followers as Jimmy Aidoo. Shaq came across him in an elevator and walked past Mr. Aidoo.

With the great sense of humor Aidoo seems to share with O’Neal, he shared the fleeting photographic proof of his encounter with Shaq with a funny recollection of the events. “Hello Good people of X (formerly known as Twitter). A bit of a life update: So I ‘bumped’ into Shaquille O’Neal on an elevator a couple minutes ago. He left the elevator just when I was about to enter. Sad he was a few secs from meeting and getting to know me. His loss.”

Sure Shaq is usually generous about interacting with fans. If Jimmy asked, he’d get a picture too. But he too let the opportunity pass by.

Aidoo is something of a witty wordsmith with a blog on sports, entertainment and culture. His day job is in data science and his usual X activity is very uplifting with some positive insights.

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He continued his description of events with the same humor in a thread of replies to his followers. “[O’Neal] will be cursing his stars wherever he is now. I mean. I tried. I even followed him to the car park but he just didn’t realize the opportunity he was missing. I feel bad for him.”

In another response, he wrote, “I feel so bad for him… he missed a golden opportunity to get to know me.” If this is Aidoo’s regular humor, Shaq definitely missed out.

Funnily, Shaq has interesting history with elevators. There’s a strong likelihood that you could spot him around one with all the elevator-related stories surrounding him.

Shaq’s elevator saga

O’Neal has let more than one elevator encounter become a missed opportunity. He saw his ultimate crush, Halle Barry outside an elevator and his stuttering kicked in before he could properly talk to her. He once tried to use an elevator ride with Stevie Wonder to verify his vision but his investigation was inconclusive.

His most recent elevator episode though was epic. Orange County firefighters were on scene at a stuck elevator around Christmas. They had a cheerleader in the form of Shaquille O’Neal on the sidelines. They successfully rescued the people stranded in the elevator and got pictures with Shaq too.

The benefit of not taking the stairs is a possible encounter with Big Diesel. Hopefully, Jimmy Aidoo gets another shot at it.

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