Shaquille O'Neal is pleased that Charles Barkley failed to win a title in his career: "I'm glad Paxson hit that shot"
shaquille-barkley
Shaquille O’Neal and Charles Barkley are brothers for life, but they frequently clash when it comes to basketball debates and discussing their respective legacies now as analysts in TNT’s Inside the NBA. Once Shaq gets triggered by their heated argument or even in just a random moment, he will automatically unleash his trump card by reminding Chuck that he has no championship rings to present.
But in hindsight, Shaq couldn’t be more satisfied with the fact that Barkley has indeed failed to deliver one, and his downfall in the 1993 NBA Finals against Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls stood out as a relieving moment to witness.
“If [John] Paxson don’t hit that shot, Mike don’t have six and Charles has one. I’m glad Paxson hit that shot; I would hate to fu****** see Charles with a ring,” O’Neal said in his recent appearance on J.J. Reddick’s Old Man & a Three podcast.
Pax destroys Chuck’s title dreams in ‘93
As it is, the 1993 Finals served as Chuck’s best shot to win a ring in his entire 19-year run in the NBA, but he got robbed of this golden opportunity to claim it simply because of John Paxson.
In this seven-game championship series where MJ was averaging ridiculous numbers of 41.0 points on 50.8 percent shooting, Paxson emerged as an unlikely hero for the Bulls, as he hit an iconic trey in Game 6 that sealed the team’s three-peat title. On the other hand, this clutch shot sent Chuck and his Phoenix Suns team toward devastation as they came up short of fulfilling their dream season and “destiny” to become the world champions.
“You just gave me a headache. Paxson, thank you. I’m glad you hit that shot. Charles with a ring? Oh my, you couldn’t tell him nothing,” the “Diesel” added.
Biggest regret
The happiness Shaq felt upon seeing Pax’s three-pointer sink in 1993 is the complete opposite of what Charles has endured. After winning the MVP award that year while leading the Suns to the league’s best 62 wins, his lofty aspirations of leading the franchise to its first title were suddenly crushed to dust out of that historic moment.
Looking back, Chuckster recently confessed that failing to give the Valley a championship is his biggest basketball regret.
“The only thing I ever felt bad about, to be honest with you, is I couldn’t win the Suns a championship,” he said. “Because in Philly, they had [three]; in Houston, they had [two]. I have always felt bad that I wasn’t able to bring a championship to Phoenix because that’s my home. When I got traded there, my life just changed dramatically.”
After 1993, Chuck and his Suns squad couldn’t run things back to the way they planned. The next three seasons gave both sides an even more haunting experience as they unsuccessfully landed on the championship stage. This forced Barkley to go for his own in 1996, until finally accepting the idea that he’d retire from the game in 2000 without an NBA championship to his Hall of Fame resumé.