LAS VEGAS – Shaquille O’Neal walked into Club SI for the event he co-hosted with David Beckham during Saturday night’s Grand Prix in Las Vegas At the party, he was smiling and speaking his best British accent. “We were very close,” O’Neill told The Courier-Journal. “I actually have David Beckham’s number and Tom Brady’s number on my phone, it doesn’t get any bigger than that.”
The last time I talked to O’Neal, he told me he wanted to help bring an NBA team to Las Vegas, but he wasn’t interested in teaming up with LeBron James. However, O’Neal has softened his stance and welcomes working with James.
“If an NBA team were to come here, I would definitely be a part of it,” he said. “With LeBron, without LeBron, I just want to be a part of it.”
Major League Baseball owners voted unanimously Thursday to approve the Oakland Athletics’ move to Las Vegas. There were rumors that the team would add minority investors, but O’Neal said he had no interest in getting involved.
“Not baseball,” he said. “Maybe football, definitely basketball, but not baseball. I want to be a part of it. There are two types of owners. Some owners just have bragging rights and I’m a part owner, and some people like to make the decisions.” At some point, I want to be involved in the decision-making process. “
After co-hosting the Club SI party for Saturday’s Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix, O’Neal, who lives half his time in Las Vegas, is gearing up to host “Shaq’s Fun” the Friday night before the Super Bowl House” party. Bowl LVIII at Encore XS Nightclub in Las Vegas.
“Las Vegas has always been the entertainment capital of the world and whoever came up with the idea of bringing Formula 1 here in the next 10 years was a genius move,” he said. “I know they’ve had some setbacks with the manhole issue, but hopefully that gets resolved. … When I first saw cars driving down the Strip, I wondered how this was going to happen, but I sat there and looked at it and I thought it was going to be a very prestigious event.”
Max Verstappen won the Las Vegas Grand Prix after claiming his third Formula One championship, but he has been critical of the Las Vegas street circuit and its over-the-top spectacle Attitude, as this kind of track is more about performance than racing.
“I don’t want to say the wrong thing,” O’Neill said when asked about Verstappen’s criticism. “I had a show a long time ago, Shaq VS., I raced against Dale Earnhardt Jr. I’ve said before that these guys are not athletes, but after a few hours behind the wheel of a car, even in a small race that wasn’t a real track, this was the most tired I’ve ever been. I don’t even know what to say. I don’t want to say the wrong thing. I just hope everyone has a smooth race and no crashes. “This is our first one, so when you’re new to something you want it to go perfectly.”
While O’Neill and Beckham are now friends and business partners, O’Neill never knew about the backlash Beckham suffered after receiving a red card during England’s 1998 World Cup match against Argentina until he watched the recently released video on Netflix Beckham documentary.
“If you haven’t seen his documentary, you should,” he told me. “It shows you how great he is and how he perseveres through it all. … We actually had been chatting, but when I saw his documentary, I called him, We had a 30-minute conversation. I said, ‘Man, I never knew you went through this.'”
O’Neal’s son Myles was the DJ at the Saturday night party, and O’Neal himself has since retired from the NBA and traveled the world as DJ Diesel.
“The appeal is the adrenaline factor,” O’Neill said. “When I retired in 2011. I didn’t have the adrenaline factor. People were cheering, booing and saying ‘fuck you’, there was a lot of adrenaline factor. When I walked to the hotel I suddenly felt excited, but it was It wasn’t enough for me. One time I went to a music festival and there were half a million people there, and I got that feeling back. I used to be a DJ, so I gave it a try. It went well. “I actually We lost money in the process, but the hour you got to see kids jumping in the carnival pool made it feel like a playoff game to me. “
O’Neal recently posted a tweet that puts life in perspective. I asked him where this sense of clarity came from.
“I ran into an old friend one day and he asked me, ‘How old are you?’ I said, ‘50. He said, “Do you know what’s going to happen next?” ” what did I say? ” He said: “60. “In nine years, I’ll be 60, and then I’ll be 70. I’ve had my trials and tribulations, and we never know when our time will be. All my kids are grown up. For me, It’s all about peace, respecting others and having fun.”