Where did the Shaquille O'Neal sleeping meme come from?

NBA legend Shaquille O'Neal has a steady presence on social media. This is clearly evident from a picture of the four-time league champion being used as a meme to describe various events.

‘Sleeping Shaq’ is being used as a multi-panel image series describing various events with the LA Lakers great in different states of wakefulness. It has been likened to the Expanding Brain meme, which shows the progression of ideas using a sequence of images showing diffent stages of spiritual or mental enlightenment.

The origin of Shaquille O'Neal's sleeping meme had was in a Facebook post published on July 24, 2016, by the Thot Patrol page. The post had O’Neal sleeping, but then waking up for “thots.”

Shaq's sleeping meme can be found on various social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. It is also being used on online communities like Reddit and Tumblr, messaging apps WhatsApp, Discord, Telegram, and image-sharing sites Imgur and Flickr.

The NBA legend is seemingly not bothered by his sleeping meme or any meme that uses him, for that matter. In an interview with the online site Nylon back in 2018, he said:

“To all the meme makers, you can make any meme you want about me.”

Shaquille O’Neal makes use of social media to voice his opinion

Shaquille O'Neal

Shaquille O'Neal is not shy in taking to social media to give his take on the current state of the NBA. Among his favorite subjects to talk about are the players today, in particular, the big men.

One instance last year involved Minnesota Timberwolves center Rudy Gobert. He criticized Gobert on his podcast for taking to social media to express his dislike about Wolves fans booing them as they felt he was underperforming.

While at it, the 2000 NBA most valuable player shared some advice to the French player and said:

"Stop taking your phone and writing to whoever's writing stuff in space. Why don't you get out there and just play? There you go. I've been booed before. You know that. You're the biggest guy there, and you ain't doing let's go!"

"Get 25 rebounds, get nine blocks. Stop letting people dunk on you. Put somebody on your ass about that instead of crying to the fans."

Shaquille O'Neal is one of the best big men to play the game. He won four NBA titles, was a three-time Finals MVP, a 15-time All-Star, an eight-time All-NBA First Team member, and two-time scoring champion. He ended his career with averages of 23.7 points, 10.9 rebounds and 2.3 blocks.