Shaquille O’Neal may be one of the greatest basketball players to ever do it, but one music reviewer said the NBA Hall of Famer’s skills don’t translate to the DJ booth.
Jim Harrington, the pop music critic for The Mercury News, didn’t mince words when he called out the former star of the Los Angeles Lakers for what he deemed a mediocre set on Aug. 11 at the Outside Lands Music Festival, held at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.
“Shaquille O’Neal is better at shooting free throws than he is at DJing,” Harrington wrote in the opening of his review. “And for those who didn’t follow his Basketball Hall of Fame career, the big guy was certainly no Steph Curry when it came to the stripe.”
His critique didn’t stop there.
“O’Neal’s grooves were weak, mismatching his samples and sounds in ways that were rarely compelling. His reliance on big beats was more tiring than inspiring,” Harrington continued. “And he truly seemed at a loss on how to command a crowd, instead settling for what appeared to be an attempt at setting a new world record for repeating the phrase ‘hands up’ the most times in a single performance.”
However, Harrington admitted the 7-foot icon, who goes by the moniker DJ Diesel, brought out a massive crowd, and some of O’Neal’s fans publicly disagreed with Harrington’s assessment of his skills.
Many went on to praise O’Neal’s turn as a DJ, particularly under an Instagram post the four-time NBA champ shared of his time at the festival. It showed thousands among a packed crowd.
“I went feral for your set,” one IG user commented. “Front legendary basketball player to a hit dj player. I love it.,” another added.
On Twitter, an EDM fan account praised the former rapper for venturing into other genres of music as a DJ. “Shaq becoming a dj is still the greatest thing to ever happen to the EDM community,” All Time EDM tweeted.
The New Jersey native released his platinum-selling hip-hop album, “Shaq Diesel” in 1993 – and followed with other album releases. He has expressed that he fell in love with music and DJing in his teens but truly committed to being DJ Diesel in recent years.
For Shaq, it’s more about doing what he’s passionate about and helping others than making money.
“My new business model is I invest in things that are going to change people’s lives,” he told Forbes. “It costs me a lot of money to rent this building, security people, who cares?! I’ll probably make some money back, I’ll probably break even. I’d rather have that title – ‘Shaq had the best party ever.’”
Despite Harrington’s take, the 51-year-old’s latest career venture seems to be working out. In addition to the massive crowd at Outside Lands, Shaq sold out shows in St. Louis, and his “Shaq’s Fun House” event was a highlight attraction at last year’s Super Bowl in Los Angeles.
In 2019, he spun records at Chicago’s Lollapalooza music festival. For New Year’s in 2022, he headlined a DJ set at the Coachella Crossroads, also in California. He once donated his entire check from a DJ performance to the families of the victims of the May Tops Friendly Markets shooting in Buffalo, New York, that injured three and claimed the lives of 10 Black people.
