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Much has been made of Jackson's philosophical approach to the game. Earlier this season, he gave O'Neal two books to read: Friedrich Nietzsche's Ecce Homo and George Bernard Shaw's Man and Superman. (Shaq admits he dipped into both but finished neither.) The works are nuanced and complex. Yet Jackson's take on the world is actually quite direct.
First off, Jackson treats his players with respect. "It's a trust sequence," says Jackson. "If you keep trusting people more and more, they get into it." Jackson is not a big screamer. He figures his players are adults and can work out most situations on their own. Typically, when a team falls behind in a game, a coach will call a timeout. Jackson, calmly sitting on the sidelines, will often let his players play on and work out their problems in the flow of the game. "With the other coaches I've had, they were great coaches, but I guess we really didn't trust them," says O'Neal. "With Phil, we trust him 'cause we know who he is and we've seen what he's done, and he treats us very well. He treats us like men."
O'Neal's new coach also recognizes that sometimes you have to lose to win. When Jackson met with his star center last summer, O'Neal weighed 346 lbs. Jackson told him he had to lose about 20 lbs. He also told O'Neal there was something else he had to give up: some of his scoring. Jackson wanted him to concentrate instead on rebounding, shot blocking and field-goal accuracy--things that would help the team overall. Jackson's firm, fair style has worked well with O'Neal, who grew up under Sergeant Harrison's discipline. "It's Phil's job to inspire us, but it gets translated down to me," O'Neal says. "He's the general, and I'm the drill sergeant."
Even if O'Neal secures his elusive championship, or a couple of them, he may never be the ubiquitous cultural figure that Jordan is. It's not because he lacks the tools. He has a personality that is both oversize and ultra-authentic, like one of those new $20 bills with the large face on them. Sometimes, in interviews, his voice is unexpectedly gentle and muffled, like something rumbling deep in a volcano. But when he gets rolling, he can be funny and engaging, blending warrior bravado, street slang and genuine insight. Jordan, for all his charm, often spoke in sanitized sound bites, like the polished business executive he's since become. O'Neal the rapper is unpredictable and, at times, eloquent. "From this day on I would like to be known as the Big Aristotle," he said when he accepted his MVP award, "because it was Aristotle who said excellence is not a singular act but a habit. You are what you repeatedly do."
So do we wanna be like Shaq? In the end, it's not just about stats--"I wanna be like Dominique" (that would be Wilkins) never caught fire as a catchphrase. And it's not just about championships--Tim Duncan is a champ, but he's still about as exciting as dishwasher liquid. O'Neal accurately dubbed him "the Big Fundamental."