No Ring For the King with Shaq

So LeBron and Shaq had some good chemistry at last year’s All-Star game, but I don’t think Shaq will get LeBron his championship when they play together this season, and here’s why. When Shaq has won championships, he’s had Kobe in LA (6-6, 205 lbs.), and he’s had D-Wade in Miami (6-4, 216 lbs.) Both are guards who prefer to take perimeter jump shots than drive the lane. Their style of play is what Shaq complements best. Not that of a forward like LeBron James (6-8, 250 lbs). Here’s what happens with Shaq under the rim: defenses need to double-team Shaq, or else he’ll swallow up every pass and use his post-up play to score basket after basket. With so many men down low, Kobe/Wade were left open—or at least under single-coverage, which is basically open, for them—so they could bury the their jump shots easily. In Kobe Bryant’s 13 NBA seasons, he has had better than 46.3% field goal shooting five times. All but one of those times he owes to Shaq. In the 2005-2006 season, the Heat won their first NBA championship with Shaq, and Dwayne Wade shot 49.5% from the field. He has never shot so well in his career, even last year when he led the NBA in PPG. But in Phoenix, Shaq wasn’t able to make a huge difference because the big stud he was supposed to play alongside was Amare Stoudemire, who looks more like a LeBron than Kobe or D-Wade. Stoudemire is a 6-10 and 250 lbs foward. Granted, LeBron is a more of a shooter than Stoudemire, but King James’s dominion is just as much in the paint as on the perimeter. With Shaq drawing so many defenders under the rim, where is LeBron supposed to go? If he tries to drive the lane, he’ll find that Shaq creates more traffic than NYC rush hour. Zdrunas Ilgauskas was happy to take passes further away from the rim and take a step-back two-pointer, leaving space for LeBron under the rim. Now, if the Cavs got Shaq as an answer to Dwight Howard, they did a good job. O’Neal will be able to stop Superman (#2) more effectively than Ilguaskas, as he is much more of a defensive force. However, he will also be an encumbrance to LeBron on the offensive side of court. Looking at the stars Shaq has played with, Lebron falls somewhere between Stoudemire and Dwayne Wade. So, look for the 2009-2010 Cavaliers to have a season that is more successful than the 2008-2009 Phoenix Suns, but not as successful as the 2005-2006 Miami Heat.