Eleven shots, his total in Game 1, simply wasn?t enough. So, in Game 2, he got five as the Heat went down two games to none.

Welcome to the new NBA. Shaq has not yet been legislated outof existence, but he has been legislated out of domination.

All those new rules that have opened up the game? They have shut down Shaq.

Blame the legalization of the zone defense. Pat Riley does.

“You have to do different things to try to post him up in the zone,” Riley said after Game 1. “That?s one of the things that the zone does, is it takes away your low-post game. You have to make two or three passes to try to catch him in the zone rather than just throw it to him and let him operate.”

It is legal now not merely to double Shaq with the ball; it is legal to double him without it. That?s what the zone allows. With a defender behind him and a defender in front, just getting him the ball is a major chore.

To make matters worse, the Heat does not have enough versatile offensive players to make the Mavericks pay for gang-covering Shaq and Dwyane Wade.

The new rules also get Shaq at the other end, where he once dominated the paint. The defensive 3-second rule prevents him from camping out there. The Mavs put his man into high pick-and-rolls and make him come out on the floor, turning a defensive asset into a liability.

“My role is a lot different,” Shaq acknowledged the other day, “but I still can be the point center, especially when we know what the defense is going to do. I would still like to touch it to keep everybody involved.”

Imagine, the Big Diesel reduced to the role of distributor, trying to set up inferior players who cannot take advantage of open looks. This from the most physically dominant big man in NBA history.

He has spent some time lately musing about the league?s transition from big men who play his style to big men who play Dirk Nowitzki?s style.

The day after Game 1, I asked him if he felt the league was legislating him out of existence. He was diplomatic in his answer, but he did not deny it.

“I don?t really think about it, or, if I do think about it, I really don?t mention it a lot,” he said. “I just try to do what I?ve been doing. Just trying to stay successful and stay unique as a player.

“There aren?t many more players like me. They are getting to be a little bit like Dirk and Yao Ming. Hopefully, that?s better for the game.”

The new NBA rewards versatile big men who can face up, not those who play with their backs to the basket. Shaq has been sabotaged so far in the Finals by a combination of the rules and his own team.

A decade ago, Olajuwon made opponents pay for doubling him down low by hitting an array of outside shooters. If you doubled off Kenny Smith, he could hit the open three. So could Sam Cassell, Robert Horry, Mario Elie, Matt Bullard, Scott Brooks, Clyde Drexler.

The Heat has only three players who shoot the three, and they have not been reliable enough to persuade the Mavs to reconsider their strategy of blanketing Shaq every time he and the ball are in the same zip code.

In the second half of Game 2, even as the Heat made a run to get back in the game, Shaq sat on the bench. Once the most dominant player in the game, he was reduced to the role of spectator in the championship series. His final line showed five points and six rebounds.

The times, they have-a-changed. It is not Shaq?s fault. This has been coming for a while. He is a dinosaur now, an enormous blast from the past, able only to watch as the new NBA pushes him toward extinction.