Shaq and Yao loom large

Shaquille O’Neal and Yao Ming are big. So big, in fact, that Shaq had to help Yao put on his official Hall of Fame blazer at Thursday’s induction press conference because John Doleva, President of the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, wasn’t tall enough to reach Yao’s shoulders. No one else in the room had the wingspan for the job.

The legacies of both Shaq and Yao are largely defined by size — big bodies, big stats, big smiles, big personalities, big hearts. Although the two giants only met 13 times during their regular season careers, as well as a five-game playoff series in 2004, their commonalities and their relationship on and off the court have served to intertwine their stories. This weekend, they will enter the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame together.

At the Hall of Fame press conference on Thursday, both players talked about how the connections between them were built. Yao talked about entering the league with respect for O’Neal, saying, “I always respected him. When you come into the league at the time I did, as a big man, you have to respect him because he was the best in the league. But he is a great guy off the court, too, more than just a great player.”

Shaq acknowledged that even for himself, one of the biggest centers in the league, Yao’s size still made him a difficult matchup.

“The first time I played against Yao, he blocked me three times in a row,” O’Neal said. “And then, you can’t stop Yao. You just have to stay in front of him and just hope he misses. He’d get it and he’d look at you, and then he’d shoot it over you. You’d have to, like, really jump to block it, and you still could never block it. He was probably my toughest matchup.”

Shaq also shared an unbelievable story, which may unbeliveable because it wasn’t true, about receiving letters from Yao as a child — letters that Shaq’s father supposedly used to teach him a lesson about respecting those who look up to him. Setting aside concerns about veracity, the story illustrates the way the two complement each other — Yao’s quiet humility a moderating side-dish for Shaq’s boisterous confidence.

It is fitting that these two are entering the Hall of Fame together, not just because of the friendship and rivalry but because of the way their careers marked a moment of transition in the NBA. Both players last took the court during the 2010-11 season. Since then, the NBA has evolved rapidly. That evolution has in many ways rendered the traditional big man obsolete.

The next generation of NBA stars, even the very biggest and tallest ones, will look nothing like Shaq and Yao.

Of the 17 active players who Basketball-Reference projects with a 50 percent or greater chance of making the Hall of Fame, just two — Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol — can be classified primarily as post players. Both have some similarities with the bigs of the past but each is very clearly of a different breed. Even looking at younger players who haven’t yet had a chance to build up a Hall of Fame resume, there are precious few who make their money primarily by leveraging size around the basket.

Over the past decade, the center position has been given over to mobility and shooting — the Al Horford’s and Chris Bosh’s of the world. Now, Kristaps Porzingis, Nikola Jokic, and Karl-Anthony Towns threaten to render that position all but unrecognizable.

When asked what his career would have looked like if he was entering the NBA today, Shaq was as confident as ever, saying, “I’d average 40 points a game, without free throws. I’d instruct my agent that if Michael Conley got $150 million, I’d probably have to get $250 [million], tax free.”

Shaq and Yao were more than just big bodies. The younger version of Shaq was an explosive end-to-end force, and even the older iteration was blessed with incredibly quick feet and precise footwork. Yao’s skill level was as impressive as his height, with refined post moves and a feathery soft jumper. Each would have been a matchup nightmare for today’s smaller and more mobile bigs, but they would have had their own matchup problems to overcome as well.

Shaq and Yao were literal and figurate giants. Now, their legacy may be to stand as a sort of conjoined Colossus of Rhodes, marking the outer edges of an era of basketball history when to be the biggest often meant to be the best.