When you think of Shaquille O’Neal, does talent come to mind? Apparently not for former basketball center Vlade Divac, who had many battles with Shaq over the years and says the former Los Angeles Lakers great was strong, not talented.
Divac, who recently was hired as the Sacramento Kings VP, battled O’Neal quite often in the early 2000’s as both the Lakers and Kings waged war for the Pacific Division crown and entangled themselves in a couple of the greatest playoff series’ in NBA history.
It was Shaq who always came out victorious when it mattered though, so some might see Vlade Divac’s comments as sour grapes when he was attempted to praise current Kings big man DeMarcus Cousins.
”I’ve been in basketball a long, long time and I have to say [Cousins is] the most talented big guy I have ever seen,” Divac said Monday. ”Shaq wasn’t talented, he was just strong. I was talented, but I wasn’t strong.”
In the most ironic of twists, Shaquille O’Neal is a minority owner of the team he once haunted and now Divac strangely enough works for Shaq, though the former Serbian basketball player doesn’t mind as he joked O’Neal was ‘always his boss’.
