Shaq talks NBA’s all-time greatest (and Kazaam) with GQ

Shaquille O’Neal really doesn’t talk clothing in his interview with GQ. Which is fine, my guess is that Shaq doesn’t really fit into anything off the rack anyway. We shop for clothes in very different worlds.

But he does talk with GQ about a number of other things, from his girlfriend (they are still together, despite what you may read) and his business degree.

GQ also asked him the question a lot of us have wondered: Why “Kazaam?”

“I was a medium-level juvenile delinquent from Newark who always dreamed about doing a movie. Someone said, ‘Hey, here’s $7 million, come in and do this genie movie.’ What am I going to say, no? So I did it. “

Kind of hard to argue with that.

Sure, they talked basketball, too. And Chris Bosh. Like why he is always so hard on Bosh.

“I’m just not calling him part of the Big 3. He put up good numbers, but he wasn’t leading Toronto to any number one spots, you know what I’m saying? One day I gave him 46 points and he was like ‘Oh, s***, Shaq cheated.’ That’s when I called him the RuPaul of the NBA. A lot of times I’m just messing around but if he thinks I’m serious, so what?”

Bosh did not make Shaq’s list of the greatest players in NBA history. (If Bosh makes your list of the NBA’s all-time greatest — and you’re name isn’t Mrs. Bosh — we need to have a talk.) Shaq broke is all-time list down by position:

Point Guard? “I probably have to give that to Magic Johnson.”
Shooting guard? “Jordan.”
Small forward? “Probably Bird.”
Power forward? “Either Barkley or Karl Malone. Or even Tim Duncan. It’s a mix-up, I’m not sure.”
Center? “Greatest center is Kareem, Wilt, or me. Depends on how you look at it.”

Kind of hard to argue with that, too.