Forget Critics, He Is Simply Big Champion From Now On

Go ahead, Los Angeles, enjoy the Lakers’ seventh championship since they moved to this city.

Put your hands on the trophy, if you can get close enough.

Then give it up.

Because this championship belongs to Shaquille O’Neal.

Quite simply, he’s the only one who needed it. And he’s the one who delivered it.

Kobe Bryant is still young enough to be thought of in terms of his potential, not his legacy.

If Phil Jackson never won again, he would always have Chicago.

But O’Neal was reaching the stage in his career where the more things he accumulated (a scoring championship, an Olympic gold medal, a most-valuable-player award) the more people talked about what he didn’t have: a championship.

This ring was mandatory for O’Neal. And he played that way every night, right on through the night that mattered the most, Game 6 of the NBA finals.

His signature on a free-agent contract with the Lakers four years ago was the reason anything short of a championship has been considered a disappointment.

His effort this year was the reason those championship hopes became realistic.

His play Monday night is the reason there will be a parade, and not a Game 7, on Wednesday.

It was on ever since the team gathered on the court for its pregame huddle.

“He said, ‘Look in my eyes,’ ” backup center John Salley said. “ ‘I’m not losing tonight.’

“ ‘He said, I want this tonight.’ ”

This is what happens when a 7-foot-1, 335-pound man wants something. He gets 41 points, 12 rebounds and four blocked shots. He scored 15 in the second quarter, when the Pacers could have pulled away.

He scored inside again and again in the fourth, when the Lakers came back and pushed ahead to the title.

It’s the type of dominant performance Laker fans have grown accustomed to.

And then, when it was over, when his little buddy Kobe Bryant and Glen Rice sealed the 116-111 victory with six free throws, O’Neal showed us something we’ve never seen in public.

He did something he doesn’t do when he gets hacked and pushed and punched in the low post, game after game. He did something he didn’t do when the Lakers kept getting swept out of the playoffs.

He cried.

“Tears were coming to my eyes because I’ve been working hard in my life,” O’Neal said. “I took a lot of bashing. ‘He’s not working hard, he’s not doing this.’ ”

“The Big Fella wanted it bad,” Laker forward Glen Rice said. “And we wanted it bad for him.”

“He’s taken a lot of criticism over the years because he hasn’t won the big one. And now he’s won it.”

And he wasn’t just along for the ride.

He became the eighth player to win regular-season most-valuable-player award and NBA finals MVP award in the same season.

The others on the list: Willis Reed, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Moses Malone, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan and Hakeem Olajuwon.

Those are some of the biggest names in the history of the sport. By winning a championship, O’Neal can now be mentioned alongside them. The ones who constantly criticize him never had to guard him.

You’ll notice you never hear players around the NBA pointing out his weaknesses. They’re usually too busy rubbing their aching bodies after absorbing O’Neal’s punishment.

O’Neal erased most of the criticism this year by leading the Lakers to a 67-win regular season, but he wouldn’t put it to rest until he won the championship.

Does he feel fulfilled?

“Somewhat,” O’Neal said. “I think, for a while, there can be no ‘buts’ behind my name.

“Now that we’ve got one, we’re going to work on two, three, four, five.”

O’Neal claimed the biggest difference in his play was that he was finally free of the knee and abdominal injuries that plagued him his first three seasons here.

There was one other notable change.

“He changed as a leader,” Salley said.

It started last summer, when he and his agent, Leonard Armato, went to Laker Executive Vice President Jerry West in separate meetings.

O’Neal said he wanted a proven, championship-caliber coach--either Phil Jackson or Chuck Daly--or he wanted out. O’Neal didn’t say what he would do if the Lakers didn’t comply. But he did hold the right to exercise an escape clause in his contract and become a free agent.

So the Lakers forked over the cash and brought in Jackson. Then Jackson brought out the best in O’Neal and the Lakers.

This is the result. Four victories in June, one championship.

Unlike the regular season, the finals MVP award vote was unanimous.

There’s no room for disagreement now.

There’s nothing left to say.

So the last words of the year belong to O’Neal, who at various times throughout this season has dubbed himself, The Big Felon, The Big Continuous, The Big IPO, The Big Luggage, The Big Poise, The Big Maravich, The Big Historical.

Got a new nickname Shaq?

“The Big Champion.”

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J.A. Adande can be reached at his e-mail address: j.a.adande@latimes.com.