The four-time NBA champion gets irritated by the former Houston Rockets player's joke about his tardiness during a heated exchange on TNT's 'Inside the NBA'.
- Apr 22, 2022
AceShowbiz - Shaquille O'Neal lost his cool on national television. The former pro basketballer player launched a verbal threat to his colleague and fellow former NBA star Kenny Smith on TNT's "Inside the NBA" after the latter roasted him for being late.
On Thursday, April 20, Shaq was late to the broadcast and missed the start of the show because he was stuck in traffic. At first the show seemed to make light of the situation as it posted a clip of all the cars that were in Shaq's way while the other co-presenters in the studio didn't take it as an excuse.
Meanwhile, in a clip of the heated exchange, Kenny kept interrupting Shaq when the four-time NBA champion tried to talk. "You need to be here on time," Kenny said with a straight face, while putting on his glasses.
The comment was met with "oohs" and praise from co-hosts Ernie Johnson and Charles Barkley, who gave Kenny a high five, but Shaq didn't appear to be amused by Kenny's joke. Taking off his own glasses, he tried to defend himself, "First of all, we start at 6:30, and I was here at 6:29, so technically I wasn't late."
"Second of all," he added, "if you try to be funny on TV again I'm gonna show you funny. I'm gonna put these paws on you." Kenny replied, "Hey, I'm Pat Riley up in here. You ain't hitting Pat Riley."
This isn't the first time Shaq came late for the TNT show. Back in October 2021, his co-hosts roasted him for his tardiness and compared him to Ben Simmons, who at the time was in a holdout with the Sixers.
The 50-year-old was also late to "Inside the NBA" pre-game show for the play-in tournament last May. At the time, Charles shouted, "What kind of dummy misses the first night of the playoffs?"
When Shaq finally arrived at work, he quietly walked on set while Ernie was breaking down the play-in format. "You can't sneak in at 7'2"," Kenny joked. Charles added, "You can't be that big and sneak," to which Shaq explained, "I apologize, I read my schedule wrong."
