325-Pound Crybaby

The NBA Playoffs began today. The "big" news of the day is the whining of Miami Heat center Shaquille O'Neal. The Chicago Bulls beat O'Neal's Heat 96-91 in the first game of their series. Shaq fouled out, and had some extremely mature comments after the game:

"My intention was to come out and be myself, until [referee] Eddie Rush derailed me," O'Neal said after fouling out.

...

He accused the Bulls of flopping and said they had "lot of help out there."

"It's just unfortunate that people fall for that," said O'Neal, who scored 10 points in the first quarter before the fouls piled up. "I'm used to just outplaying somebody and just playing hard, but I guess that's what you got to do to stop Shaq."

O'Neal went on to say that, "The inconsistency is just very frustrating." While I readily acknowledge that inconsistency in officiating is indeed very frustrating, I didn't hear him complaining about the "inconsistency" that limited the Bulls' Kirk Hinrich to just 2 points in 19 minutes due to 5 fouls and a technical, or some of the bogus calls that were called in Dwyane Wade's favor.