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USA Today Sports Media Group
USA Today Sports Media Group
Sport
Blake Schuster

Pedro Martinez found something Shaq is worse at than free throws: batting practice

It was only about a week ago the Inside the NBA crew invited their TBS baseball counterparts over to Studio J to help Kenny Smith demonstrate a play live on air.

The fun little crossover event took an even more entertaining turn when that play resulted in Curtis Granderson scoring a bucket on Shaquille O’Neal—much to the absolute dismay of the Big Diesel.

Well, it was only fair the TBS crew invite Shaq over to their studio and offer him a shot at redemption with a little batting practice. The only slight problem, as pretty much anyone who has played the sport will tell you, is that hitting a baseball is very, very hard.

It’s even harder when the man throwing that baseball is Hall of Famer Pedro Martinez.

Needless to say, it did not go well for Shaq.

Oh dear.

What an unenviable position for Lauren Shehadi, too, having to give little league instructions to one of the greatest athletes ever. It’s not like Pedro was even throwing heaters. He was just lobbing them over the plate so Shaq could make contact.

Martinez even joked the only way O’Neal is getting on base is by leaning into a ball.

Then again, Pedro might want to be careful with his words. All it takes is one swing for Shaq to demolish a pitch and leave Martinez’s ego bruised forever. Kind of like what Granderson did to Shaq last week.

 

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