San Diego Reader

I was listening to sports radio when I first heard Shaq dissing Kobe Bryant yesterday. What made this especially fun to hear, was that I was talking to one of my friends when the Lakers were down a game to the Celts. Or maybe it was when they were down two games, I'm not sure when we had the conversation. But I said that Shaq is probably happy to see that Kobe isn't going to win a ring with the Lakers. He insisted that Shaq has better things to do than worry about Kobe.

I said that it's not like Shaq is walking around worrying about Kobe. But my take was this. When the two played together, Kobe had said (and coach Phil Jackson even said this in his book) he didn't get enough credit. Shaq was the one that was named the MVP on those teams that won the championships.

And, what happened when the two stopped getting along, and Shaq was shipped off to another team? Well, a few years later, the Lakers didn't make the playoffs. And, Shaq won yet another championship.

Shaq was the class act, though, when he found out a few years back that it wasn't Kobe that got him shipped out of Los Angeles, but actually Lakers owners and management. They were tired of him getting injured and being out of shape. And, with the older Shaq not getting along with the young Kobe, it just wasn't worth paying him the millions. Shaq came out and admitted that he realized now, it wasn't Kobe. A real class move on his part.

Kobe, when he was accused of raping a woman in a Colorado hotel, was kind enough to ask the police why he couldn't just pay the woman off the way Shaq does when women come around (and he was kind enough to buy his wife an eight million dollar diamond). The police were nice enough to release this info to the press. And, Shaq's wife was nice enough to try to stay married to a guy like that for another couple of years, before calling it quits.

So my guess was, Shaq was enjoying himself, as the Lakers lost by almost 40 points. The worst loss ever in an NBA Finals game.

But I wasn't positive. Nobody ever has proof on such things. Or so my friend said.

And as I drove home, I hear Shaq rapping on stage at some nightclub. He had released a couple of rap CDs in the early 90s. So him singing (if you want to call rapping that), is nothing new. But, his lyrics validated my argument.

He rapped about Kobe not winning a ring without him. He rapped about how he's now divorced because of Kobe's comments on him paying off women.

It was all very funny.

And, well, I'm convinced Kobe will probably never win a ring without Shaq. He complained the Lakers didn't have a good enough team. They brought Phil Jackson back for $12 million a year. They went out and got Pau Gasol in a steal. And they still didn't do it.

So there's really only one thing left for Kobe to do. No, not convince Mitch Kupchak and Jerry Buss to get Tony Parker or someone like that. It's for Kobe to release a rap CD. Think of all the things he can respond to Shaq about. He can talk about his weight, his stupid Superman tattoos, his bad free throw shooting....oh, the possibilities are endless.