NBA Legend Shaquille O’Neal Making AEW Debut

Go big. Wrestling is a unique form of entertainment as it is indeed pre-determined, but at the same time the wrestlers are still very real athletes and the things that they have to do in a match are not exactly easy things to pull off. It can be interesting to see what happens when other athletes are brought into a wrestling ring and we will be seeing the same thing again this week.

Every now and then you find a mainstream athlete who is interested in doing something in the wrestling world. They might pop up more than once and sometimes it turns out that they are pretty good at wrestling for a change. It can help if they have certain physical attributes, and one such person has been brought up by AEW recently. Now we know a bit more about the situation.

AEW has announced that NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal will be appearing on this week’s edition of Dynamite. This comes after Jade Cargill had said that she knew O’Neal and hinted that he would be coming to AEW to deal with Cody Rhodes. O’Neal is advertised for an interview with Tony Schiavone but it is not clear what he will be talking about. This will not be O’Neal’s first foray into wrestling as he made multiple appearances in WCW and was also a participant in the 2016 Andrew the Giant Memorial Battle Royal at WrestleMania 32.

BREAKING NEWS@Shaq addresses #AEW with @tonyschiavone24!

Watch #AEWDynamite this Wednesday night on @TNTDrama 8e/7c or https://t.co/GdI7QAsxEP by @FiteTV for our International fans. #AEWonTNT pic.twitter.com/447b0wIfnd

— All Elite Wrestling (@AEW) December 8, 2020

He does have a history. Check out O’Neal’s time in wrestling:

Opinion: Something makes me think that this is more of a corporate crossover event than anything else, as both AEW and O’Neal’s Inside The NBA both air on TNT. If that’s the main reason why this is taking place then so be it, as that is not something that can be put on AEW. At the same time though, I don’t know how much interest this will generate, as O’Neal has been out of basketball for years and may not be able to offer all that much star power.

What do you think of O’Neal in AEW? How will they use him? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 50,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 5,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his- Amazon author page with 30 wrestling books. Get the latest and greatest in professional wrestling news by signing up for our daily email newsletter. Just look below for “GET EXCLUSIVE UPDATES” to sign up. Thank you for reading!