People all over the world have offered opinions about the recent practice altercation between Golden State Warriors stars Draymond Green and Jordan Poole.
Former Los Angeles Lakers big man Shaquille O’Neal recently went at fans of the game who have criticized Green for the matter.
“You guys that don’t know anything about competitive sports, you have no idea what you’re talking about,” O’Neal said. “So just shut the hell up and be a fan. … This happens all the time. I’ma go on record. I touched a lot of people up.”
O’Neal is known to be someone that dishes out tough love, so it’s no surprise to hear that he “touched a lot of people up” during his career. He was definitely one of the NBA’s most competitive players when he was in the league.
Many people that have tons of experience in the league have come out and said that fights are nothing new. Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, who was involved in a practice fight with Chicago Bulls legend Michael Jordan in 1995, mentioned that he has seen many altercations during his time in the league.
Steve Kerr: “In 32 years, I’ve probably seen 20-plus fist fights. It should not make it out of our walls. We need to be better.”
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) October 8, 2022
The key difference between the Green-Poole altercation and other similar incidents that have taken place across the league’s history is that a video of Green punching Poole made the rounds on social media.
Draymond’s punch on Jordan Poole pic.twitter.com/lsvlCUwZcC
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) October 7, 2022
Therefore, O’Neal cannot really blame fans for giving their opinions on the matter. If a video of the incident hadn’t been leaked, then things would’ve probably blown over pretty quickly. However, since video footage was leaked, fans are allowed to give their thoughts on it.
It is one thing to hear about the incident from reporters like Adrian Wojnarowski and Shams Charania, who get their information filtered from different sources. People being able to see what happened themselves is something entirely different.
It will be interesting to see whether or not O’Neal gets some flak for his latest take. Given what is known about his personality, he likely will have no problem taking some heat and later responding to it.
