288: 124: The Battle of Hypocrisy (Vote for monthly ticket!)_2 288: 124: The Battle of Hypocrisy (Vote for monthly ticket!)_2 Harlan also warned Mourning, telling him that painkillers could potentially cause renal damage.
Moreover, a true hardman can’t just rely on little pills to keep going.
But with Mourning’s personality, he seemed not to care at all, “As long as it lets me play, that’s all that matters!”
Riley and Mourning wouldn’t think too much about it; they just wanted results—to crush the Orlando Magic!
Harlan shook his head, what else could he say?
He knew Mourning was tough, none of the centers produced by Georgetown University were weak.
But he didn’t anticipate that Mourning had reached a point where he was utterly disregarding his health; it was only the regular season, after all.
Pat Riley always seemed to come across players who were willing to be pushed to their limits; Harlan really didn’t know whether this was Riley’s luck or the players’ misfortune.
On the Heat’s side, they had already prepared for the upcoming Florida derby.
However, on the Magic’s side, there were some minor episodes before the big game.
Two afternoons before the game, Shaquille O’Neal, who was about to return, appeared in Bristol, Connecticut.
He was invited today to participate in an ESPN radio interview program at the ESPN campus.
In the program, the radio host, Tony Bruno, with his many years of talk show experience, created an extremely relaxed conversational atmosphere, and Shaq got more and more excited as they talked, crossing larger and larger lines.
“Roger’s legs are the longest I’ve ever seen, you all know what I mean.”
I’m only second in the whole locker room!”
“Michael Jordan is like an old luxury car; no one denies his past glory, but now he has to give way to new cars.”
As the conversation went on, they inevitably talked about the Magic and Shaq’s contract renewal issue.
“Shaq, before the local newspaper Sentinel ran a poll asking if the team should spend a lot of money to keep you.
A whopping 65% of fans thought it wasn’t worth it.
What happened to cause such a poll result?
Was it because of the injury impact?”
This was undoubtedly an explosive question and one that needed cautious answering, but the thick-skinned Shaq still kept his usual unfiltered style:
“Nothing happened, just some people playing their pressure games on me.
Once I’m back, I’m gonna dunk and then yell into the camera to Mr.
DeVos: ‘Give me the money!’ Yeah, he’ll do it, because they need me.”
O’Neal, with an almost arrogant attitude, called out the Magic management.
After the show, Shaq immediately received a call from his agent, “Buddy, you probably shouldn’t do that, disrespecting the boss is not a good negotiation tactic!”
“Is it really that serious?
I was just joking, I have absolute respect for Mr.
DeVos.” O’Neal spoke the truth; he hadn’t thought that his words would have any impact.
“And you said the poll was some kind of trick pressure from someone.
Are you firing shots at the management?”
“No, if I wanted to fire shots, I would name names directly.
Besides, what I said was the truth.
That jerk John just wanted to use the media to rush me back and express his dissatisfaction with me.”
“Even if you didn’t mean it that way, John Gabriel must already feel like you are calling him out!
If you crave a contract equal to Roger’s, you’ve got to stop saying these things!”
O’Neal felt annoyed, wondering why he needed to be so cautious.
Had he not played in last season’s finals?
Or was his average score just 5 points per game?
Wasn’t it only natural for the Magic team to give him a high-paying contract renewal?
Shaq’s controversial statements threw the Magic into a whirlwind; the next afternoon at the AdventHealth Training Center, John Gabriel, the man behind the curtain, became the main topic among journalists.
Now all the journalists were curious as to whether the Sentinel poll was actually a pressure tactic by the Magic management.
O’Neal flatly denied this, “I never said it was management; don’t try to use me as an excuse to stir up trouble in the team.
Such tricks won’t work on me.”.
Roger was succinct in his answer to this issue, “I have nothing to say about this matter, no comment.”
Although both key players refused to answer the question, the media’s favorite thing was to speculate wildly.
The idea that contract renewal negotiations between the Magic and O’Neal were not going smoothly became a consensus among all media, and they were reporting frantically about it.
This issue indeed created a rift between management and players.
Rich DeVos believed he had always respected his players, but he was quite dissatisfied with the way O’Neal talked on the radio, too high and mighty.
John Gabriel was the angriest because he felt betrayed.
Why would O’Neal say that?
Why did he think the newspaper poll had anything to do with management?
Only two people could have told Shaq about it, either Roger or the equipment manager Jacob Diamond.
That day of the conversation, only the two of them were present.
Roger knew who had told Shaq; he had never mentioned any connection between Gabriel and the Sentinel to avoid damaging the relationship between management and O’Neal.
But the last time when Shaq backed him up, he remarked, “Nothing escapes Shaq’s ears.”
Considering that Jacob had a good private relationship with Shaq, it was quite normal for him to share some information with Shaq.