The feud between Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal spelled the end of a dynasty for the Los Angeles Lakers. The highly publicized falling-out and subsequent divorce were both unavoidable and unsurprising to those like John Ireland, who saw firsthand how two superstars in their own right, were unable to get out of each other’s way.
At the time, Ireland was a sports anchor for KCBS/KCAL-TV in Los Angeles. Now, he serves as the play-by-play voice for the Lakers radio broadcasts. Few are better equipped than Ireland to talk about the Kobe-Shaq feud, as he recently joined the Awful Announcing Podcast and recounted his version of events that played into one of the most infamous divorces in all of sports.
“Not surprised, I was mad. Because we thought that if those guys could’ve stayed together, it would’ve been it,” Ireland told Brandon Contes on the Awful Announcing Podcast, regarding the fall-out and eventual break-up of Kobe and Shaq.“It was too Type-A personalities that both — at the time — needed to be the man.”
Ireland gave a one-minute analogy of what he thinks happened:
“Kobe was the first guy to practice every day and the last one to leave. The hardest-working guy in the gym I’ve ever seen…No matter what time I would get to an arena…I would go there and Kobe would be there. 10 o’clock in the morning, two o’clock in the afternoon. Now, transition that to Shaq. Shaq was the life of the party, fun-loving guy. Would be the last guy to walk into practice and the first one to leave. So Kobe thought, ‘Why am I doing all this work? I’m busting my *** and we’re running the whole offense and the whole defense through Shaq.’ Well, [the Lakers] should have been running that stuff through Shaq because he was the best player in the league and he was unstoppable. And Phil Jackson tried to explain that to Kobe and he said, ‘Look, he doesn’t have your work ethic, but what he does have is size and skill that no one else can match. Your size and skill is great, but you’re not Shaq. So, we’re gonna run this thing through Shaq.’”
Ireland believes that once Bryant had his first crack at free agency — if Shaq was still on the team — he would’ve left. And left for the Los Angeles Clippers, who were heavily rumored to be his preferred destination.
“Mike Dunleavy, who was coaching the Clippers at the time, has told me that Kobe told him he was coming,” Ireland said.
That’s when the late Dr. Jerry Buss, then the majority owner of the Lakers, sniffed it out, according to Ireland. Buss realized that if he didn’t cut bait with Shaq, he was going to lose Bryant to the Clippers. And that’s when he traded Shaq to Miami. Buss knew if he didn’t, Bryant was going to leave.
It turned out to be the right decision.
“It all worked out in the end, but I don’t think there was anybody; Jerry West tried, Phil Jackson tried,” Ireland said. “I don’t think there was anybody that could’ve gotten those guys to exist in 2004.”
Ireland wanted to make it inherently clear that the narrative that Kobe and Shaq hated one another was false. This is a pair that went to four NBA Finals and won three championships together. If they hated each other, Ireland doubts that they would’ve been able to accomplish such a feat.
While they didn’t hate each other, what ultimately led to their demise is that Kobe did not respect Shaq’s work ethic. And Shaq couldn’t understand why Kobe didn’t get that he was unstoppable, which by all accounts he was.
“I will say this, towards the end, Shaq made a concerted effort to try to repair that relationship before he got traded,” recalled Ireland.
Shaq privately had come to Ireland and asked him to interview him one-on-one. He wanted it out there that Kobe Bryant, not Shaq, was the best player in the National Basketball Association.
Shaq knew that Ireland would tell Kobe — he did — but it didn’t matter.
“Kobe was just convinced that the Lakers were not going to run the team through him, they were gonna run it through Shaq,” said Ireland. “And he thought that Shaq was going towards the end of his career and Kobe was just starting in the beginning and Kobe wanted his own team. I think in the end, that’s what broke them up.”
“Kobe was pretty driven and pretty competitive, so I think it worked out the way it should.”