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Former LA Lakers superstar Shaquille O'Neal took to Instagram to share a story featuring him sporting a gray-haired wig after losing a bet to TV host Anthony Adams.
On "The Big Podcast With Shaq," host Nischelle Turner held an episode featuring O'Neal and Adams, nicknamed "Spice Adams." O'Neal shared a post by Adams which contained the clip. Wondering why O'Neal was sitting with a towel over his head, Turner prompted Shaq to remove the towel and debut his new look, to which the big man said:
"What you don't know Nischelle is that me and Spice had a bet. Spice has put a damn perm in my head. And look, it don't move either."
The bet with Adams was that the Dallas Cowboys would beat the San Francisco 49ers. However, Dallas lost in the playoffs 23-17 Sunday, and O'Neal had to hold up his end of the bet.
Spice Adams is also a comedian and a former defensive tackle who was drafted by the San Francisco 49ers in the second round of the 2003 draft. Adams also played four seasons with the Chicago Bears from 2007 to 2011 before announcing his retirement in 2013.
Shaquille O'Neal and his NFL dream
Many NBA players have been part of discussions about whether they could have played professional football. Given their physical prowess, the likes of LeBron James, Michael Jordan and other NBA players have been touted to play in the NFL. Shaquille O'Neal was also part of this conversation.
Standing at over 7 feet, O'Neal was a force of nature and is widely considered to be the most dominant force the NBA has ever seen. Along with his height, the sheer girth and size of Shaq made him unstoppable near the post as he wreaked havoc in the NBA for the better part of two decades.
O'Neal was so dominant that the only way to even come close to stopping him, at times, was for the opposition to employ a tactic called "Hack-a-Shaq." Hack-a-Shaq involved players deliberately fouling the "Diesel" in a bid to send him to the free-throw line, where Shaq was a below-average shooter.
But O'Neal said the tactic didn't really work because his first love was football and that he used to love hitting people on the field. This enabled him to absorb the impact of those hard fouls.
O'Neal also talked about how he was more into football than basketball until his father showed him clips of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and other great NBA centers. Whether O'Neal could have made it as a professional football player is something no one will ever ever know. But it is worth pondering the kind of damage Shaq would have caused had he played in the NFL.
Guess the Lakers players!
