Shaq vs Timmy Christmas matchup 1999

[70sFan]

Hi there!

Welcome in the 2024 year!

Today, working on a Shaq breakdown video, I decided to upload Shaq vs Duncan Christmas matchup from O'Neal MVP season and after Duncan's first ring.

Watch on YouTube

The game was a rare example of both players guarding each other for the majority of the game and the offensive results were not pretty. Here are H2H scoring numbers:

Shaq guarded by Duncan: 14 points, 3/14 FG, 8/10 FT
Duncan guarded by Shaq: 14 points, 5/12 FG, 4/7 FT

You can watch it on your own of course (I hope you will), but a few points stand out:

- Duncan struggled immensly vs Shaq's size, he couldn't create a good shot in the post against him,
- that's why Duncan tried to stretch Shaq out, but his midrange game didn't work that game and he was missing everything,
- SAS lack of creation from guards was really visible in this game,
- Shaq didn't create many easy baskets on Duncan either,
- Duncan's lower body strength is very underrated, he absorbed most of Shaq attacks better than anyone and rarely gave Shaq deep positions to work with,
- Shaq manhandled Duncan on the glass, he was extremely difficult to box out,
- Shaq showed a few cool moves on Duncan, including a shimmy hook taken from faceup isolation.

Give me your thoughts about this underrated matchup from almost 25 years ago!

[Peregrine01]

Shaq always struggled a lot more against stout, sturdy defenders with lower centers of gravity. Guys like Rodman and Malik Rose gave him a lot more trouble than Robinson and Mutombo. Always thought that TD was a way better defender against Shaq than Robinson was for the same reasons.

I think Barkley put it best when summarizing his success in the NBA: "it was my big ass against their skinny little legs".

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

[SHAQ32]

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

You should appreciate the lack of physicality in today's game

[70sFan]

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

I'm not sure, I haven't made my breakdown of Jokic post game and I know that NBA.com shooting data can be unreliable, but based on the league stats Jokic has been shooting all sort of hooks at 56% this season (and they are not all from post up isolations). He shot them at 60% in the playoffs last year, that's a very good but not "guaranteed twos".

Another thing is that it's easy to score those when you play against smaller, slimmer guys (often after being switched on perimeter players), but it's a different matter when you are being guarded by behemots like Shaq or Duncan.

Of course I don't want to take anything away from Jokic, his touch around the basket is exceptional.

[Doctor MJ]

...and they called him Timmy Christmas. No one could say how old he was. They only knew that he was there when the joined the team, and would probably be there after as well. Timeless as the North Pole.

[MyUniBroDavis]

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

I'm not sure, I haven't made my breakdown of Jokic post game and I know that NBA.com shooting data can be unreliable, but based on the league stats Jokic has been shooting all sort of hooks at 56% this season (and they are not all from post up isolations). He shot them at 60% in the playoffs last year, that's a very good but not "guaranteed twos".

Another thing is that it's easy to score those when you play against smaller, slimmer guys (often after being switched on perimeter players), but it's a different matter when you are being guarded by behemots like Shaq or Duncan.

Of course I don't want to take anything away from Jokic, his touch around the basket is exceptional.

Looks like a lot of shaqs hooks are when he sees a second defender stunting too rather than playing off the difficulty to stop him backing down

[therealbig3]

Duncan would have been one of the best Shaq defenders of all time if it was his job to do so like a Malik Rose. He had a ridiculously strong core and lower body, while having the length and timing to really disrupt Shaq's shots.

Conversely though, Shaq is also the exact type of defender that Duncan always had issues with. He can't do anything against him in the low post, and Duncan was never a great midrange shooter that could really take advantage of the space Shaq would give up in the midrange. He could make them occasionally, but unlike a Garnett or obviously a Nowitzki, he wouldn't kill you from there, it was really just to give the defense a different look from time to time and to set up his face up game and as an adjunct to his low post game. Turning him into a volume midrange shooter, which Shaq would do, wouldn't really work out that well.

I think in this matchup, it seemed that Shaq gave Duncan a harder time than Duncan gave him, although, Duncan slowed him down and gave him as hard of a time as any defender I've seen, especially against peak Shaq in his MVP year. Although having David Robinson as a help defender is a huge benefit. On the other hand, I don't see Shaq needing a lot of defensive backup against Duncan. That's kind of the main difference between the two offensively. Shaq was able to force more help against an elite post defender than Duncan was able to. But we know that, that's why Shaq is on the short list of the GOAT offensive bigs and Duncan is not.

[Peregrine01]

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

I'm not sure, I haven't made my breakdown of Jokic post game and I know that NBA.com shooting data can be unreliable, but based on the league stats Jokic has been shooting all sort of hooks at 56% this season (and they are not all from post up isolations). He shot them at 60% in the playoffs last year, that's a very good but not "guaranteed twos".

Another thing is that it's easy to score those when you play against smaller, slimmer guys (often after being switched on perimeter players), but it's a different matter when you are being guarded by behemots like Shaq or Duncan.

Of course I don't want to take anything away from Jokic, his touch around the basket is exceptional.

Yeah. Guaranteed is hyperbole. It's as close to automatic as anything I've seen.

[-Luke-]

1:46: Duncan quintuple-teamed.

[70sFan]

1:46: Duncan quintuple-teamed.

He should have passed the ball in that possession. Duncan's improvement as a passer throughout his career is the most underrated aspect of his development.

[70sFan]

More Duncan vs Shaq videos from 2002 WCSF (I made it during the beginning of top 100 project):

Shaq

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Duncan

Watch on YouTube

[Owly]

Shaq always struggled a lot more against stout, sturdy defenders with lower centers of gravity. Guys like Rodman and Malik Rose gave him a lot more trouble than Robinson and Mutombo. Always thought that TD was a way better defender against Shaq than Robinson was for the same reasons.

I think Barkley put it best when summarizing his success in the NBA: "it was my big ass against their skinny little legs".

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

Can't speak to all the data, or know exactly how teams matched up and rotations. Can't go full on comparison versus Duncan.

But there's somewhat of the air an implication in the "way better" that Robinson wasn't effective against Shaq. And from memory full-prime "Robinson versus Shaq" (I think eliminating rookie Shaq because he wasn't fully there yet so circa 94-96, inverted commas because it's Spurs versus Magic and it's not a one-on-one production game) it seemed like the Spurs and I would guess Robinson took quite a substantial chunk out of Shaq's overall production/efficiency based on BPMs ...

will quickly check
'94
Shaq year avg
6.8
game averages
3.9
2.6
(Robinson 14.0, 20.1)

'95
Shaq year avg
5.8
game averages
-0.4
0.4
(Robinson 5.7, 13.5)

'96
Shaq year avg
3.7
game averages
0.6

(Robinson 8.0)

Just one number, not limited to defense, noisy (we don't know substitutions etc), small sample, only for one particular period in time and not necessarily the one you had in mind... so plenty of caveats ... and it doesn't necessarily alter the principle about archetypes ...

That said if I were to say one player were struggling with the other ... I'd say Shaq was really struggling versus Robinson.

[Peregrine01]

More Duncan vs Shaq videos from 2002 WCSF (I made it during the beginning of top 100 project):

Shaq

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

Duncan

Watch on YouTube

Man it's eye-opening how stodgy those offenses were. What's even more interesting is the defense. I chuckled out loud how often the Lakers went to double Duncan against Shaq which led to the only real good looks the Spurs got.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

You should appreciate the lack of physicality in today's game

there's not any less physicality in the post today while there are way more complex defenses and reads to be made

[70sFan]

Edit: Watching this also made me appreciate Jokic's GOAT touch. Those little missed hooks from 5-10 feet from both Shaq and TD are pretty much guaranteed twos from Jokic.

You should appreciate the lack of physicality in today's game

there's not any less physicality in the post today while there are way more complex defenses and reads to be made

To make the picture clear, there is also way more space and less size on average. It's not that clear which era made it easier for post players to thrive.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

You should appreciate the lack of physicality in today's game

there's not any less physicality in the post today while there are way more complex defenses and reads to be made

To make the picture clear, there is also way more space and less size on average. It's not that clear which era made it easier for post players to thrive.

Not really sure there's that much more space in the post, now. In particular if you consider how much more difficult getting the ball is when you have your guy fronting an another one lurking behind.

[70sFan]

there's not any less physicality in the post today while there are way more complex defenses and reads to be made

To make the picture clear, there is also way more space and less size on average. It's not that clear which era made it easier for post players to thrive.

Not really sure there's that much more space in the post, now. In particular if you consider how much more difficult getting the ball is when you have your guy fronting an another one lurking behind.

That's before getting the ball down low and teams have plenty of counters against that. Besides, post game isn't limited to getting the ball on one side of the paint, it's easier than ever to establish deep position for a quick hook or strong finish.