i didnt see the game last night (phx and orlando), but i heard the comments made my Stan Van Gundy. did anyone see the game? how bad was shaq's flopping? only thing i could find was this <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/ifDl0fNDEr0&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/ifDl0fNDEr0&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
that's about as bad as you can get. while i'm happy an offensive foul wasn't called, I also know that on equal atrocious flop attempts, they have been called in the past. i'm with bullard. they won't stop until they are penalized. which means two things. first, refs need to have a complete category on their by game report cards for flops - how good or bad they were at calling them, etc. and, second, there should be a czar of flops or even a team, one guy from the league office, one representative from the players union, and a third guy agreed upon by both those two guys, and the three of them should jointly look at flops for everygame and players should be monetarily penalized for flops.
I will bet any amount of money that if that's Yao dunking it instead of Howard, they call that an offensive foul every single time. According to NBA refs, Yao isn't even allowed to post up.
So true. I find it very odd how guys can just grab him and twist him around but the second he tries to be physical back and establish position, his man flops and the refs fall for it. They have to be smarter than that. Either don't call anything or call the fouls as you see them. Dont reward flopping.
Shaq rips stan van gundy MIAMI -- The so-called "Hate Shaq" tour took a sharp turn in the opposite direction Wednesday, becoming the "Shaq Hates" tour. Phoenix Suns center Shaquille O'Neal ripped his former coach, Stan Van Gundy, on Wednesday after Van Gundy complained about O'Neal flopping the previous night in a loss at Orlando, pulling no punches in one of the stronger diatribes of his 17 1/2 year career. "I heard his comment. Flopping to me is doing it more than one time, and I realized when I tried to take the charge, as I went down, I realized that that play reminded me of his whole coaching career," O'Neal said of Van Gundy. "And one thing I really despise is a frontrunner, so I know for a fact that he's a master of panic, and when it gets time for his team to go in the postseason and do certain things, he will let them down because of his panic. I've been there before, I've played for him." Van Gundy coached the Heat during his first season in Miami before Pat Riley replaced him 22 games into the 2005-06 championship season. In the Van Gundy camp, O'Neal was blamed for helping engineering the change behind the scenes. Miami had the East's best record in 2004-05 but lost to the Detroit Pistons in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals, and Van Gundy was replaced after the Heat went 11-10 to start the '05-06 season. "Like I said, one thing I really hate is a frontrunner, and I despise frontrunners," said O'Neal, who used the word "despise" at least a half dozen times, then repeated his comments for Miami and Phoenix print reporters who were late arriving to his pregame rant. When finished, he stopped an ESPN.com reporter and said he wanted to make sure one additional quote was printed: "Now I see why everybody who plays for him doesn't like him." The episode that inspired this latest Shaq rant came after O'Neal took an elbow to the chest from Dwight Howard during a third-quarter Magic possession during Orlando's 111-99 victory and crumbled to the floor looking to draw an offensive foul. "I was shocked, seriously shocked," Van Gundy said, "and very disappointed because he knows what it's like. Let's stand up and play like men, and I think our guy did that tonight." O'Neal acknowledged he had flopped, but said it was the first time he had done it in his career. Over the years, O'Neal has been particularly critical of players (most notable Vlade Divac) who had flopped while trying to defend him. "Flopping is playing like that your whole career. I was trying to take the charge, trying to get a call. It probably was a flop, but flopping is the wrong use of words. Flopping would describe his coaching," O'Neal said, steering the conversation back to Van Gundy. "I'm not going to just sit abound and let nobodies take shots at me, and he is a nobody to me. And if he thinks he can get in a little press conference and take shots at me like I'm not going to [give] something back, he's got another thing coming." "I said I flopped, but flopping is falling and crying and complaining to the ref. I tried to take a charge. The rules say when a guy comes into your chest and you fall, that's an offensive foul, and that's all I tried to do. I fell, didn't complain, he made a great move, spun and dunked it, but flopping is the wrong choice of words. So that's all I've got to say about that, but again, I despise frontrunners, I despise them. And that's what he is to me." http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=3953133
Shaq admits to flopping and gets all pissy because he thinks "flopping" means doing it for a whole career instead of just once? god, i like shaq...but shut up. you flopped. he called you out. you admitted to it. No reason to fire back http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=3953133
I agree. Shaq basically fires a nuclear bomb after getting a poke in the ribs. Completely classless move by Shaq.
I'm a referee for middle school and high school and I always call a block every time someone flops....I never just ignore it.
i will also bet if that's yao falling down instead of shaq, noone will accuse him of flopping. yao falls down 1 zillion times a game nobody cares. shaq falls down once everybody's all over him. lol
I don't get how a guy can do a freestyle and tell Kobe to tell him how his butthole tastes.....and then say that they never had any problems and that Phil Jackson created it. Does he think people are that stupid?
It follows up what I thought were some fairly cheap comments on Dwight Howard nicely. For such a big tough guy he sure is sensitive- he's got a bad case of sour grapes or something. If he were really comfortable with his legacy and certain he was really the "MDE", he wouldn't have a need to respond to little things like this in such a classless way.
I think Shaq got sensitive to SVG remarks. It's not like Shaq has a history of flopping or did he try to do it on multiple occasions during the game. SVG kind of questioned Shaq's integrity and manhood over one poor defensive play, and Shaq got pissed. You know if someone would have questioned Dream's manhood during the day, he would have came back and recorded 10+ the next time they played.
