Shaq Releases New Book: Speaks On Feud With Kobe, Writing Love Letters to Halle Berry & Life After Retirement



Shaquille O’neal is about to tell all in a new book titled ‘Shaq Uncut: My Story’.

In the autobiography, he opens up about everything  from his beef with former L.A Lakers teammate Kobe Bryant, his days of writing love letters to Halle Berry and his newfound retired life.
 
He also gives details on what was really behind some of the basketball drama that led up to him threatening to kill Kobe, hazing rookies back in the day until he was ratted out by Kobe and how Kobe’s biggest dream was to become the “Will Smith” of the NBA.

Here are a few interesting excerpts:

On What Caused the Beef With Kobe
So I’m on edge because I don’t have a new deal, and Kobe is on edge because he might be going to jail, so we’re taking it out on each other. Just before the start of the ’03-’04 season the coaching staff called us in and said, “No more public sparring or you’ll get fined.” … Phil was tired of it. Karl Malone and Gary Payton were sick of it. … So what happens? Immediately after that Kobe runs right out to Jim Gray and does this interview where he lets me have it. He said I was fat and out of shape. He said I was milking my toe injury for more time off, and the injury wasn’t even that serious. (Yeah, right. It only ended my damn career.) He said I was “lobbying for a contract extension when we have two Hall of Famers playing pretty much for free.” I’m sitting there watching this interview and I’m gonna explode. Hours earlier we had just promised our coach we’d stop. It was a truce broken. I let the guys know, “I’m going to kill him.”

Kobe stands up and goes face-to-face with me and says, “You always said you’re my big brother, you’d do anything for me, and then this Colorado thing happens and you never even called me.” I did call him. … So here we are now, and we find out he really was hurt that we didn’t stand behind him. That was something new. I didn’t think he gave a rat’s ass about us either way. “Well, I thought you’d publicly support me, at least,” Kobe said. “You’re supposed to be my friend.”

Brian Shaw chimed in with “Kobe, why would you think that? Shaq had all these parties and you never showed up for any of them. We invited you to dinner on the road and you didn’t come. Shaq invited you to his wedding and you weren’t there. Then you got married and didn’t invite any of us. And now you are in the middle of this problem, this sensitive situation, and now you want all of us to step up for you. We don’t even know you.” …

Everyone was starting to calm down when I told Kobe, “If you ever say anything like what you said to Jim Gray ever again, I will kill you.”

Kobe shrugged and said, “Whatever.”

From that day on, I was done dealing with Kobe. I was done dealing with Jim Gray, too. What goes around, comes around. When he got fired, he actually had the nerve to call me and ask me to help him out. What, did you lose Kobe’s number?

On Kobe Being Immature
He was so young and so immature in some ways, but I can tell you this: everything Kobe is doing now, he told me all the way back then he was going to do it. We were sitting on the bus once and he told me, “I’m going to be the number one scorer for the Lakers, I’m going to win five or six championships, and I’m going to be the best player in the game.” I was like, “Okay, whatever.” Then he looked me right in the eye and said, “I’m going to be the Will Smith of the NBA.”

My first Lakers season we had a couple of rookies, and we hazed them pretty badly. We were dogging them out constantly. It was “Go get my bags, go get me something to eat.” It was kind of a rite of passage in the NBA that a lot of teams do, but we probably went a little too far with it. One of the rookies—Derek Fisher—just took it. The other rookie—Kobe Bryant—ratted us out to Jerry West.

On Writing Halle Berry
I remember being in the dorm room one night and we were watching the movie Jungle Fever with Halle Berry in it, and I thought she was so stunning, so I wrote her a letter. I was just kind of kidding around, telling her I was a big fan and I’d love to meet her sometime. The guys totally goofed on me for doing it, but I didn’t care. A few weeks later, no lie, Halle Berry wrote me back. She sent me a signed picture that I still have hanging in my office. Turns out she’s a basketball fan. She wrote, “I’m a big fan of yours, too. I can’t wait until you get to the NBA.”

On Life After Retirement
They’ve already got some things cooking in Hollywood for me. Adam Sandler called me in June 2011 and said, “I want you to be in some of my movies.”

I’ve stayed fairly low-key about what I own. For instance, out of the fifteen twenty-four-hour fitness places I own, only three have my name on it. None of the Five Guys I own have my name on it. None of the clubs I own in Vegas, either.

I guess Shaq borrowed some of those “writing skills” from Karrine “superhead” Steffans. After all, it is a tell- all book. I wonder if he will go into the real reason him and Shaunie split or if he really slept with Laura Govan. I guess we will have to wait and see. ‘Shaq Uncut’ hits shelves on November 15.

spotted @necolebitchie




5 responses to “Shaq Releases New Book: Speaks On Feud With Kobe, Writing Love Letters to Halle Berry & Life After Retirement”

  1. Demetria says:

    I think there might be a little beef after all this done over with

  2. Brittany Cooper says:

    Not for nothing, all the Kobe info is great but I wanna know what’s up with Shaunie and the divorce, his relationship with Hoops,etc. I am just that nosy lol

  3. Ateya says:

    Good for you Shaq! Good Luck!

  4. Shante says:

    Yeah we wanna hear the juicy stuff not the basic boring stuff

  5. admin says:

    Man…Shaq is a pussy..he’s not gonna do shit for real

    Tiffany

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