One of the largest men in Lakers history could only muster one word when he saw how team owner Jeanie Buss slighted him.
In response to Buss’ ranking of the top five most important Lakers of all time — which included Kobe Bryant, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, LeBron James, Magic Johnson and Phil Jackson — all Shaquille O’Neal had was confusion.
“Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy,” he wrote on Instagram on Wednesday with a graphic of the five Lakers Buss had chosen, adding a stunned photo of himself.
Buss’ list is from a 2021 interview on the “All the Smoke” podcast with Matt Barnes and Steven Jackson, in which the two co-hosts asked a stressed-out Buss to list the five Lakers she deemed most important across the franchise’s storied history.
After Barnes prompts Buss to include Jackson, her one-time fiancé and the Hall of Fame coach that led the team during its three-peat with Bryant and O’Neal, she pauses.
“Does Phil count?” Buss asks before admitting that he would round out her picks.
The Lakers owner’s list generated controversy at the time, as fans and Lakers legends alike wondered how Buss could leave off legendary player, coach and executive Jerry West in addition to O’Neal.
“I saw the other day Jeanie Buss made a statement, the five most important Lakers, one of the most offensive things I’ve ever heard in my life,” West said on the “Hoop Du Jour Podcast” in May 2021.
“I was there a lot of times, had a lot of success. Be curious to know if they would have had that success if I hadn’t been there.”
O’Neal, who spent eight seasons with the Lakers and delivered the team three championships alongside Bryant, averaged 27 points, 11.8 rebounds, and 2.5 blocks per game during his years in purple and gold.
He was named to the All-Star team in all but one year in Los Angeles.