'My uncle is 7-foot and about 330 pounds,' Miller said, 'and he'll bust your hand just shaking it.
'I've been around big people my whole life. Yeah, Shaq's big and can push me around. But he can't guard me because I can step outside and use my quickness on him.'
'It's not a fight, it's a basketball game,' Oakley said. 'We're going to play the same way we played the last time. The league determined that Shaq threw the punch. We didn't throw a punch.
'But it's not like we're scared of Shaq or the Lakers. The Lakers are a good team with good coaches and good players. When you win championships, you can talk mess.'
'One thing about Chicago,' Lakers coach Phil Jackson said in his inimitably tweaking way, 'they may not be extremely talented, but they play very hard.'
Said Bryant: 'I think Brad Miller saw the punch Shaq tried to throw at him. I don't think he'll put himself in that predicament again.'
Artest harassed Bryant into 1-for-9 shooting down the stretch of the last meeting. Reminded that Bryant had derided the Bulls' use of confetti to celebrate home victories and said that he'd be waiting for Wednesday's rematch, Oakley smiled.
'We'll have somebody waiting on Kobe, too,' he said. 'Ron-Ron (Artest's nickname) The Rottweiler.
'I like Kobe. He's a first-class guy. But he's got something to prove. And Ron's a competitor. I've seen the kid work. I know how he watches film. He's watched more film on this game than he probably has all year.'
Said Artest: 'They can talk all that whatever, but we're going to play real aggressive. And if they want to get dirty, we'll get dirty.'
While he wouldn't go as far as Artest, Miller did say O'Neal can expect another night like Jan. 12 if he suits up.
'We're still not going to give him layups,' Miller said. 'Coach [Bill] Cartwright is bringing in the 1987-88 [Detroit Pistons] Bad Boys and trying to not give up layups. That's how we've been playing since he took over. Nothing was different for Shaq.'
Cartwright said he doesn't expect Oakley to play and insisted his absence had nothing to do with local product Tyson Chandler's increased role.
'When a guy says he's hurt, in my mind he's hurt, especially a guy like Oak who's an everyday worker,' Cartwright said.
'Any game against the world champions is a fun game,' Cartwright said. 'We just want to play aggressively, like we did the last time.'
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-000009404feb06.story?
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'We're leaning toward not playing him,' Laker Coach Phil Jackson said Tuesday morning. 'There's no doubt about it. [But] if Shaq said, 'I want to play and that's all there is to it,' we'd be more than willing to be compliant.' If it means anything, Miller expects O'Neal to play, then to abuse O'Neal with his blurry first step.
'I'm not going to chicken out,' he said. 'If I weighed 350, I wouldn't be missing the game. He's going to play. I'm sure he's just blowing this all
