TNT turned back time to do a deep dive into the origin of one the greatest inside jokes of Inside the NBA. It predates even Shaquille O’Neal joining the crew. In those days, May 21, 2004, when Magic Johnson was still an analyst at TNT, Shaq may have triggered a beef with Kenny “The Jet” Smith that spanned 20 years and counting. It wasn’t about a race to the board or disagreement over the MVP. It wasn’t even about Kenny’s team once sweeping Shaq out of the NBA finals. This one is personal! Their kids are all grown up and this is one is back to the fore.

The crew replayed an interview of then 3x champion Shaq saying, “Kenny, he’ll never be on my level.” In that same interview, he said Chuck was definitely on his level but pretended Kenny was a nobody. In 2004, Ernie Johnson had to ask Kenny what he did to make Shaq mad.

Turns out, it’s Shaq who made Kenny mad. Kenny has relayed this story a few times before including back then in 2004. His son, Kenny “KJ” Smith Jr., was in the same class as one of Shaq’s three daughters. Shaq would pick up KJ along with his daughter from school and take him for a haircut. Now we know from his entire tenure on TNT that hair is a sensitive subject to Kenny. “I was like, ‘Yo, you can’t pick up my son, take him to get a haircut without me knowing, how you going to do that, then cut it a different way?’ So that’s where it all started out.”

That time they weren’t the best friends they are now. They had played against each other on the court and Shaq’s interview proved he saw him as nothing more than Chuck and Magic’s colleague on TV then.

Apparently kidnapping KJ and giving him unauthorized haircuts is why Kenny was hard on Shaq when he was a player. And Shaq responded by treating him like a nobody. They’ve had their share of revenges ten times over since becoming Studio J colleagues. But today is when they bury this beef.

Uncle Shaqie-Wackie to the rescue

Kenny brought back this story on an old edition of The Big Podcast adding that he nearly called the cops on Shaq. And yet Shaq only discovered in 2024 this is why Kenny was mad at him for years. He thought he was doing a nice thing when he used to see KJ in tears and took him along on an outing. ‘Uncle Shaqie-Wackie’ also said he took KJ along because, “I know he’s safe with me.”

Guest analyst, Draymond Green contended that Shaq was being nice. But Kenny was not having it. He turned the question on Dray who immediately backtracked at the idea of someone picking his kids from school.

In the era without cellphones, Kenny had to go through Ernie and a few others, including Shaq’s famous bodyguard Uncle Jerome, to get KJ back. The only reason they’ve put this behind them is because their kids are all grown up. But we live for Inside the NBA’s Inside Jokes.