At home with Shaquille O'Neal

Ebony, March, 1995 by Lisa C. Jones

He vaults from behind the basket, back arched, arms extended, ball merely falling from his fingertips. But he isn't shattering backboards on the court or impishly destroying lamps at his grandmother's New Jersey home as he did as a child. Shaquille O'Neal, the 23-year-old Orlando Magic megastar center and master dunkster, is tossing a miniature basketball through one of the many hoops positioned throughout his sprawling, two-story, $7 million home in an exclusive Orlando, Fla., suburb.

Standing 7-foot-1 and weighing a staggering 303 pounds of pure muscle, Shaquille Rashaun (an Islamic name that means "little warrior") can afford to kid around. In 1992, after his sophomore year at Louisiana State University, he became the first pick in the NBA draft and since has rebounded and slam-dunked his way to All-Star status. His power-packed, rough-edged playing style led to a handsome seven-year, $41 million contract with the Orlando Magic. But it was his raw talent and imposing frame coupled with his charismatic, boyish charm that prompted fans and media moguls alike to tag him as Michael Jordan's heir apparent.

O'Neal, an articulate, soft-spoken star in his own right, refuses to make such a comparison to the retired Chicago Bulls star. "They paved the way for the rest of us," O'Neal says, respectfully speaking of Jordan, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson and others he considers legends as well as mentors. "I'm not a legend - yet. I just work hard at what I do."

Over the past three years, the NBA marquee player's work has paid off in power jam leaps and bounds. From the time he arrived on the pro scene, O'Neal not only has been seen as the savior of the fledgling expansion team (whose record went from 21-61 to 50-32 just a year after his arrival), but an American icon and a multimedia celebrity. In addition to his basketball accomplishments, he has a platinum gold rap album, Shaq Diesel; a box-office movie, Blue Chips; an autobiography, Shaq Attaq! My Rookie Year; and a host of cola and sneaker commercials under his belt. Not to mention a personal net worth estimated at $70 million.

But inside his palatial, 17-room retreat with its marble floors, vaulted ceilings and neoclassic design, the surprisingly mild-mannered jock speaks more like a restless kid than the king of an ever-growing empire, which includes a private company that manages all "Shaq"-trademarked products. In spite of his fame and fortune, O'Neal says he has been unable to fulfill one childhood dream - going to an amusement park. "I've never had a chance to do that, not when I was younger and not now," he says bashfully. Besides being faced with the possibility that his presence at a public park could cause a mob scene, the seven-footer says there is another reason why his fantasy hasn't come true. "I can't fit in the seats," he says.

In the early years, he also had a problem fitting in and doing the right thing. "Yes, I did a little of everything: fight, curse, I was bad," O'Neal recalls. At his worst, he says, he jumped from rooftops, threw tissue bombs at teachers, pulled school alarms, even bullied classmates. But his mischief and his stepfather, Philip A. Harrison, soon caught up with him.

Harrison, a military man, married Lucille O'Neal when her son was two years old. A tough disciplinarian, Harrison kept Shaq in line with a swat on the butt when discipline was called for, O'Neal remembers. "I got tired of butt-whippings, so I asked my father one day what I needed to do to stop getting them. He said, `Do right,' so I did."

That lesson did not sink in immediately, but eventually a maturing O'Neal replaced his penchant for mischief with a love for sports.

An "Army brat," O'Neal moved with his family every three years, shifting from his hometown of Newark, N.J., to bases in Georgia, Germany and San Antonio, Texas. He recalls having a modest, yet happy, childhood, one in which his father, now a retired Army supply sergeant, worked three jobs to make ends meet. Yet the sergeant, O'Neal says, always took the time to coach him in football and basketball.

Pride and respect reverberate in O'Neal's voice when he mentions his parents, the two people he credits most for his success. He refers to his mother as "Mommie," and calls Harrison his harshest, yet fairest, critic. The bond that O'Neal shares with his parents and his siblings - sisters, Lateefah, 17, and Ayesha, 16, and brother Jamal, 15 - is a cord that fortune, fame and even O'Neal's estranged biological father have been unable to shake.

"He left me and my mother when I was just a couple of months old," O'Neal says of Joe Toney, the biological father he says he never knew. Nevertheless, Toney recently resurfaced, making appearances on several talk shows in hopes of meeting with his famous son. "I didn't hear from him through high school or college. But now that I have money, he's showing up on Howard Stern's show," says the basketball star.

O'Neal has refused to say more than a cordial hello to Toney through a third party. And he says he has no plans to make room in his life for Toney as a father or a friend. As O'Neal sees it: "I have a father [Harrison], and I have enough friends."