Shaquille O’Neal says his WrestleMania match with Big Show ‘probably’ isn’t happening, and it’s not his fault

We’d heard from one side of the long-planned Shaquille O’Neal/Big Show WrestleMania 33 match last week, when WWE posted a weird interview with Show calling out the NBA Hall of Famer for dodging him and hinting the bout wouldn’t happen.

Now, on the latest episode of his The Big Podcast with Shaq show, O’Neal is giving us his version of events. Unfortunately for fans looking forward to throwdown between giants, the only difference in the two versions is whose fault it is that Shaq Diesel won’t be in Orlando:

It’s not going to happen? That’s probably right. It’s not my fault, that’s all you need to know. It ain’t my fault… Oh, it ain’t my fault. It don’t matter what they say. It has nothing to do with the Diesel and his management. That’s what I got to say, but, it’s not totally off yet but it’s not looking good. But it doesn’t matter, I’m still working out and I still look better than Big Show. I’ll still meet him wherever he wants to meet me. These next thirty days, I’m about to go hard. I’m still doing it like it’s going down.

If this were anything other than pro wrestling, I’d say this was time to put a fork in our hopes for the match. Heck, even considering we’re talking about sports entertainment, this is probably a wrap. At this point, a month away from the show, WWE would like to be promoting this contest in mainstream media and having Shaq talk it up while sitting at the Inside the NBA desk.

But, this is creating some tension that didn’t really exist between O’Neal and WWE, so it could be used to generate heat for what was otherwise just a sideshow-type attraction.

Shaq also says he’s training twice a day this week and that if Show shows up, it’s “going down”. Which is an odd way to approach something that’s “probably” not happening.

You giving up hope for this one, or do you still think we’ll see this Mania hoss fight?