Shaq fires back at Kendrick Perkins’ criticism of him

Mar 24, 2017; Los Angeles, CA, USA: Former Los Angeles Lakers center Shaquille O’Neal speaks during a NBA game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Minnesota Timberwolves at the Staples Center. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

Two former Boston Celtics centers are going at it this week.

Kendrick Perkins appeared this week on “The Michael Kay Show” and spoke on the national narrative surrounding the New York Knicks ahead of the playoffs. When Kay mentioned that pundits such as Shaquille O’Neal and Charles Barkley have been low on the Knicks, Perkins called them out for supposedly not watching the Knicks play.

“Obviously they don’t watch basketball,” said Perkins of O’Neal and Barkley, per SI. “I’m serious, they can’t watch basketball on a consistent basis. The only time they actually probably watch the Knicks is when they’re covering the Knicks on their game nights. If you’re watching the New York Knicks, there’s no way in hell that you can just downplay the way they’ve been playing the game of basketball.”

For his part, O’Neal, who was actually briefly teammates with Perkins on the 2010-11 Celtics, fired back at those comments in a post to X.

“can a non hall of famer speak on two hall of famers just asking,” O’Neal wrote in response.

Though it is true that O’Neal and Barkley are Hall of Famers while Perkins is not one, that is not a very convincing rebuttal to Perkins’ point. O’Neal, who recently stated that he believed the Orlando Magic would sweep the Knicks in a potential future playoff matchup, has made very apparent that he does not regularly keep up with many of the players and teams that he speaks on. In fact, O’Neal is even notorious for butchering countless players’ names.

To Perkins’ point, there does indeed seem to be a national media skepticism surrounding the Knicks, in spite of their 50-win season this year. Even on Perkins’ own network (ESPN), some top voices have refused to give the Knicks their flowers.