Vlade knows flopping

Stop flopping, Shaquille O’Neal used to yell while he stood over a prone Vlade Divac.

You’re a flopper, O’Neal would scream after another of his massive elbows to Divac’s face had the former Sacramento Kings center sprawling on the floor.

Over a 16-year NBA career that spanned time with the Lakers (twice), Kings and Charlotte Hornets, Divac earned a reputation for flopping.

So, was Divac a flopper like O’Neal maintained or did he play good defense?

“Well, I tried to play defense,” Divac said. “But when they did call a foul on Shaq, I tried to make sure they called a foul. How about that?”

Divac laughed.

“He was much stronger than I am,” Divac said. “You tried to defend him. What are you going to do?

“Thank God there was no yellow card in basketball because I would get a red card every game.”

Divac, an avid soccer fan, said he had planned on going to South Africa to watch the World Cup, but changed his mind when his native country of Serbia did not get past the first round.

He still watched the World Cup matches and was just as amused when a player would flop, falling to the turf as if he had been smashed by, well, Shaq.

“Well, sometimes they really get hurt, but most of the time they try to get the foul,” Divac said. “But now with the new rules, they can get the yellow card real easy.”

When he sees a player fall to the ground, does Divac think he truly is injured, faking an injury or is it gamesmanship?

“In soccer, you don’t want to see anybody get hurt,” said Divac, who has homes in Serbia and Los Angeles. “The first thing is to see if he’s hurt.

“Most of the time it happens like that, though, that they are faking. But like I said, the last year or so they changed the rule, so now there’s less those kinds of things because they get a yellow card.”

broderick.turner@latimes.com

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