My Kobe Story
It was the summer of 1996.
I was 10 years old. Michael
Jordan had just completed his first full season since returning from his
hiatus. The Bulls had won a then-record
72 games on the way to the championship.
They beat the Seattle Sonics lead by the best dunker in the NBA, Shawn
Kemp, and of course “The Glove” Gary Payton.
The Sonics had beaten the reigning two-time champion Houston Rockets in
the second round. The Rockets would soon
retool by adding Charles Barkley in hope to regain their championship
pedigree. The Bulls biggest threat was
seemingly the Orlando Magic, who knocked them out of the playoffs the previous
year. They met for a final showdown in
the Eastern Conference Finals. Orlando
however came in limping with multiple injuries to key role players like Horace
Grant. Shaq and Penny had somehow had
even better seasons than the year before when they shockingly made it to the
Finals, only to be swept by the Rockets.
At full health, maybe they could have went toe-to-toe with the “Unstoppa-Bulls,”
but they didn’t. And Shaq’s impending
free agency left a giant question mark on the future of the NBA’s brightest
young team.
Now I know you’re thinking, “What in the hell does that have to do with Kobe?” And in reality, it probably doesn’t have anything to do with him. What it does show is how passionate I was about the NBA in ’96. My love affair with the NBA was at an all-time high. Still, I felt that I needed to look to the future. Who would be the new crop of talent to catch my eye? I figured there would be no better place to look than the upcoming draft.
The ’96 draft was the first NBA draft I ever watched. I had watched NFL drafts before with my parents. Well, I watched the first round. NFL drafts were giant snooze-fests at the time, and probably still are. I wanted to see what the NBA had to offer. And what a year I picked to start with.
June 26th, 1996 will go down as a night of
arguably one of the best drafts ever.
1984 and 2003 are it’s only real rivals.
For my money, ’96 is the deepest.
The other two are more top-heavy and I feel don’t have the overall
strength of the ’96 one.
I’ve written about this one before, but here are the highlights:
Pick 1: Allen Iverson
2: Marcus Camby
3. Shareef Abdur-Rahim
4. Stephon Marbury
5. Ray Allen
6. Antoine Walker
14. Peja Stojakovic
15. Steve Nash
17. Jermaine O’Neal
20. Zydrunas Ilgauskas
24. Derek Fisher
And with the 13th pick, the Charlotte Hornets select… Kobe Bryant.
That was the big one and the total game-changer. Wait, what’s that you say? You think I made a typo? Kobe only played for the Lakers? Well technically yes that is true, but they didn’t draft him. On a draft night trade, Kobe was swapped to the Lakers for Vlade Divac in what will go down as one of the greatest lopsided trades in history.
My ten year old brain made a note of that trade. (It also made note of the Ray Allen for
Stephon Marbury trade that happened that night, but those ramifications weren’t
quite as impactful to me.) I wasn’t sure
what to make of a high school kid going straight to the NBA. Well actually I could, I thought it was
awesome. But I did think that it would
be risky. What if he sucked? I remembering hearing about a guy doing it
the year before (Kevin Garnett) now here was another. (Fun fact: Jermaine O’Neal also jumped
straight out of high school in ’96, but got absolutely no press for it despite
being picked only three picks after Kobe.
He had a slow start, but became one of the NBA’s best centers for a few
seasons on the Pacers. He also was a key
participant in the “Malice at the Palace,” but that’s neither here nor
there.) I heard the commentators talk
about what a risk it was to take someone so young and inexperienced, and in
Kobe’s situation, someone so skinny.That all made sense to me. It was a risk. So I totally understood why the Hornets would trade him for a proven NBA center. Still, I thought his upside potentially being a superstar was enticing. I made a mental note that night I was going to keep my eyes on “that kid.” I also made a note to keep my eyes on that number one draft pick Allen Iverson. My thoughts were, since he was the number one pick, he had to be the best player, a safer choice, and therefore a good player to hitch my wagon to. Well that is the ideal scenario, but there is the term “bust” for a reason. Luckily for me, I picked two winners on that night, as Iverson and Kobe became the defining players of their generation.
I mentioned earlier about Shaq becoming a free agent. And as things would turn out, he would sign
with the Lakers that offseason, and thus be teammates with Kobe. That was interesting. So my thoughts going into the ’96-’97 season
were:
1. Can the Bulls repeat and win their fifth championship?
2. What will Kobe and Iverson do?
3. What will happen to Penny and the Magic without Shaq?
We know what happened with the Bulls. We unfortunately know what happened to the Magic and Penny Hardaway specifically. (Check out the 30 for 30 if you missed it.) As for Iverson, he jumped out of the gate, won Rookie of the Year, famously broke the ankles of MJ, and eventually would become an MVP within four years. (This is also the last I’m going to write of him for this piece.)
As for Kobe? He had a very modest 7.6 points per game. He showed his occasional flash of brilliance, but he was very raw. Part of the limited output was that he only played about 16 minutes a game. Why? Because the Lakers already had an all-star shooting guard named Eddie Jones.
Jones is very much forgotten about in Laker lore. His Laker contemporary Nick Van Exel is seemingly the more beloved (from that era of pre-Shaq), but less talented player. Van Exel was much more a “in your face” point guard (very much a 90’s trademark) and loved to jack up the three ball. Eddie was a quiet guy, but a much more rounded game. He was a consistent All Defensive Team guy in the late 90’s, and even made All NBA 3rd team in ’00.
At the time, casual fans were calling for Kobe to become the new star guard, but even I knew that Jones was the superior player at that point. However, my dream scenario was to move Kobe to the small forward to have a starting five of: Van Exel, Jones, Bryant, Elden Campbell (remember him?), and Shaq. And while that lineup was used at times, it was never a prominent strategy and one that my little brain couldn’t figure out. Being a tad bit older and wiser now I can see that there was no way that they could have four guys on the court that were extremely ball-dominant. Kobe would come off the bench for the time being.
Kobe’s rookie season can be essentially wrapped up in two performances. First, he won the dunk contest that year. He showed some serious swag and superstar entertainment value that people had been clamoring for since he was drafted. Secondly, was his four air balls in the Lakers season-ending loss to the Jazz. Due to injuries, foul-outs, and ejections, Kobe found himself playing major crunch time minutes in a do-or-die game against the seasoned Jazz. Obviously he still had a long way to go.
Coming into the ’97-’98 season Kobe had grown an afro and looked much more comfortable out there. He doubled his scoring average from the previous year to 15.7 points per game, and came in second in the Sixth Man of the Year voting. The Lakers as a whole were rolling. Their 61 wins was second to only the Chicago Bulls and Utah Jazz at 62 wins a piece.
Then something happened at All Star weekend. Kobe was voted as a starter for the West team. I was shocked. At the time I didn’t realize the fans just voted their favorites even if they’re not the best representation of the game’s elite (a huge pet peeve of mine). He was the youngest player ever to start an All Star game. My mind was blown. I wondered how Eddie Jones felt with his backup starting over him? I wondered how Kobe was going to fare against all the greats in the hallowed halls of Madison Square Garden. One that was also rumored to be Jordan’s last one (and it was- for a couple of seasons). What happened ending up being my greatest basketball memory up to that point.
Kobe came out guns a blazing (a trend that would continue
for the rest of his career) and put on some amazing highlights that I find
myself still watching to this day on YouTube.
Not only could Kobe hang, he looked dominant! Had Jordan not been there, he would have won
All Star MVP no doubt in my mind. Did I
also mention that Shaq, EJ, and Van Exel also made the All Star team? It’s still a record for number of players
representing one team. I was on cloud
9. Things couldn’t have been
better.
In the playoffs everything came crashing down. The Lakers were again defeated by the Utah Jazz, this time in the Western Conference Finals in a nasty sweep that I still recall the pain in the pit of stomach. Those damn Jazz better beat the Bulls now! I remember thinking. Of course they didn’t.
My basketball world was then shaken up quite drastically the following season. Nick Van Exel and Eddie Jones were traded. I was shocked. My 12 year old brain couldn’t fathom how getting rid of two all-stars could be the right answer. The reasons now for doing so are much clearer. With those two gone, it allowed other players like Rick Fox, Robert Horry, Derek Fisher, and Brian Shaw to step up into bigger roles. These guys weren’t ball-dominate players, and were much better compliments to Kobe and Shaq. Yes, it was now truly Mr. Bryant’s time to shine.
A funny thing happened around the ’99-’00 season. I completely lost interest in the NBA and basketball in general. There was a multitude of reasons, but I think you could chalk it up to being burnt out. This lasted all the way until the ’06-’07 season. Yes my friends, I missed the three-peat (one match-up was against Allen Iverson and the Sixers even), the Colorado scandal, the Kobe/Shaq beef and subsequent breakup.
During my hiatus Kobe had become a top five player in the
NBA. All NBA, All Defensive, and a scoring
champion. Wilt Chamberlain’s 100 points
in one game seemed completely untouchable.
That is until Kobe sniffed it in January of 2006 with a whopping 81
points. That year he also scored 62
points, IN THREE QUARTERS! He had the
highest scoring average in 20 years. The
Lakers weren’t any good, but you can’t blame him for lack of trying. You could argue it was at the detriment of
his teammates, but I’m not getting into that argument now.Watching Kobe in 2007 was quite a bit different than it was when I last left in 2000. He unquestionably was the most talented guy on the court, and could score at will. Though the team as a whole couldn’t come anywhere close to the talent of teams like the Pistons, Suns, Mavericks, or Spurs at the time. That is until they traded for a big man named Pau Gasol.
Pau was everything Kobe was not. He was quiet, good-natured, and a complimentary player. He wasn’t as dominate as Shaq, but was a much better fit for Kobe, especially at that time. Pau and Kobe gelled instantly. Along with the returning Derek Fisher, and a healthy Lamar Odom, the Lakers absolutely glided to the NBA Finals in 2008. Unfortunately they ran into a juggernaut- a revamped Celtics team that won the series 4-2.
The vultures were out for blood after that. Pau is too soft, Odom is too soft, was the common statements in the media. It was true that Garnett and Perkins bullied Gasol around that series, and Odom drifted in and out, but was calling for their heads really the answer? Gasol is as technically gifted of big man as there has ever been, and Lamar Odom is a Swiss-army knife. Those aren’t exactly the type of talents that grow on trees.
Odom and Pau were thought to be traded after this. I thought everybody was nuts. They had a good thing going despite the proverbial ass-kicking they received in the Finals. Fortunately management agreed with me, and both were brought back the following season, with vengeance on their minds.
Nobody ever questioned Kobe’s toughness. If you did, you were obviously a moron because he proved it time and time again. The question was, could he get it to rub off on his teammates? The Lakers had another phenomenal regular season in ’08-’09, even beating the Celtics on Christmas day that year in a nail-biter. (Every game they had for the next two seasons was decided by one point. Go look it up, I’m not exaggerating.) That was all well and good, but it’s the postseason that matters.
Trevor Ariza was starting at the small forward spot now. He was actually the third guy to do so. First was Vladimir Radmodovic, (he got benched then traded for an Adam Morrison and Shannon Brown. Morrison became a world-class bench celebration guy, and Brown became instant energy off the bench) then was Luke Walton. Walton being a good teammate, which eventually translated into now being a good coach, gave up his spot for the more defensive-minded Ariza. Ariza made some huge plays in the playoffs, and they definitely wouldn’t have won without him that year.
Something snapped in Kobe during that postseason. He would start snarling during games. He was a man on a mission. He barely said anything during interviews. I loved it. The projected Finals match up was between the Lakers and Cavaliers. Unlike Kobe, LeBron and the Cavaliers would dance around and be boneheads before, after, and sometimes during the game. They were the best team in the regular season however. The guys had chemistry, no doubt about it. However when it was time for the NBA Finals, the “Dancing Lebrons” were already knocked out, and the “Snarling Kobes” were waiting.
An unlikely opponent met them in the 2009 Finals. It was the Orlando Magic. They had handily beaten the Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference Finals, and looked to be rolling. I think they choked a bit under the pressure, but for the purposes of this blog, Snarling Kobe was too much for them to handle. (Which he was.)
The Lakers won the series 4-1, but there was a few intense
games thrown in there. Games 2 and 4 in
particular. Game 4 will always be
remembered as the game Derek fisher hit two monster three pointers to win them
the game. (Trevor Ariza also hit some
big shots right before this, but they were obviously overshadowed.) “Soft” Gasol annihilated Dwight Howard, which
in my eyes redeemed him from any shortcomings the previous year. Howard was clearly the best center in the NBA
at that point, so for Gasol to take it to him like he did was no small
feat. Speaking of Gasol, there is an amazing camera shot from this series that I feel encapsulates he and Kobe’s bond. In the play, Kobe has the ball at the top of the key, Pau in the post, clearly makes eye contact with Kobe, with a nod of the head Kobe drives it to the hole before dishing it to Pau for the slam. It was poetry in motion, and shows how those two just “got” each other. More so than any teammate Kobe ever had.
I was on cloud 9, 10, and 11. That was the first championship I watched the Lakers win live, because as I said, I was burnt out during the ’00-’02 run. When I look back, that was my favorite Laker team. I thought they had great chemistry as a unit, and I loved their run through the playoffs that year. Could they repeat?
The ’09-’10 team wasn’t nearly as cohesive as the previous year. Trevor Ariza got a better offer to go to Houston. His replacement was the NBA’s resident bad boy Ron Artest. I didn’t like this move at all. Firstly, I loved Ariza if you couldn’t tell already. So anyone was going to be a letdown to me. Secondly, this dude was trouble. I don’t need to get into his history, but I thought the con’s definitely outweighed the pro’s.
Kobe had some injury issues throughout the year as well. It seemed like they couldn’t get things kicked into high gear. They didn’t have bad season by any stretch. They won 57 games. I just felt the drop-off from last season was pretty substantial from a chemistry perspective. I definitely had a hard time seeing them repeat as champions.
I remember the Lakers being in a real rut right before playoff time. It was so bad (in my mind) that I was wondering who I would root for after the Lakers got bounced out in the first round. Well they didn’t get bounced in the first round. They played the upstart Thunder team, who took them to six. Winning one game after Pau rebounded a Kobe miss with time running down, only for the put back and the win. It was awesome.
Things started to look up, after a sweep of the Jazz (who were banged up) the next round, they took on the Phoenix Suns. The series went to six, and eerily reminiscent of round one, Ron Artest got a rebound from a Kobe miss with time winding down, with a put back for the win. It was crazy. Ron had been screwing up all year, and in my mind, had been a huge disappointment from whatever expectation I had (which wasn’t much). He also hit a big shot in the Finals too, so I will give him credit there.
So the stage was set for the 2010 Finals. Lakers vs. Celtics yet again. It definitely made for entertaining
television with the shared history the teams had. In 2010 both teams had struggled throughout
the year, before finally pulling it together in the playoffs. The Lakers, and in particular, Snarling Kobe
still felt the sting from 2008’s disappointing loss to these same Celtics, and
were out for blood. The ’10 Finals were as back and forth of a series as you will see. The Lakers looked totally dominate game 1. The Celtics came roaring back to win game 2. But, back come the Lakers (with some more heroics from D-Fish) to win game 3 in Boston. Still, Boston rallies to win game 4.
With the series tied 2-2, I was nervous. For a lot of reasons actually. The day of game 5 my daughter unexpectedly made her debut in the world. Like most first time fathers, I was extremely nervous/tired/stressed/happy/confused as game 5 took place. I watched it on a fuzzy TV in the hospital, but my mind was a bit preoccupied. The Lakers ended up losing that game, and were headed back to Boston for game 6. A year before I would have been shaking in boots. At that point I remember thinking, that’s too bad, but I have too much on my mind to worry about this series.
I have no memory at all of game 6. I know I watched it, and I know the Lakers won, but that’s it. Which honestly shocked me, I thought they were done. But, Boston couldn’t close it on their home floor. Back to L.A. for a game 7. Celtics vs. Lakers game 7, you couldn’t script it any better.
With the newborn baby sleeping beside us, I watched as the Lakers took down the Celtics to win a very low-scoring game. Kobe had a bad shooting night, which Bill Simmons likes to remind everyone to this day. It didn’t matter, the team pulled it together, and they were the Snarling Lakers that night.
In 2009 I was jumping up and down after their win. This time around, I was sitting on the couch smiling a big grin, occasionally looking down at my sleeping little baby while Ron Artest thanked his psychiatrist in his post game interview.
The 2011 and 2012 seasons were pretty good years, but both ended in second round losses. Adding Dwight Howard and Steve Nash the following year was expect to thrust Los Angeles back into the championship picture. However both were catastrophic for entirely different reasons. But some other big news happened in game 80 of that year.
Kobe tore his Achilles tendon that game, and that essentially was the end of his career, at least how we had known it previously. Many thought it was indeed the end. That Kobe Bryant had played his last game in the NBA. I wondered myself. He didn’t have anything left to prove. But in typical Kobe fashion, he rose to the challenge of getting back, and getting back to an elite level. Could it be done?
He missed the first few games of the ’13-’14 season still recovering from the Achilles. He made it known he would be returning on December 8th. I can still remember the commercials hyping his return. I hoped he could be a good player again. But I knew that father time was taking his toll, and he would never be the same player again.
When he did return, he was definitely rusty, but with good reason. No one could return from a potentially career-ending injury like nothing happened. Then something did happen. Six games later, he broke his kneecap and missed the rest of the season. Well okay, that’s it. He really is done now. I was positive this time. Most people echoed the sentiment. Two major injuries in a row? Time to hang up the Nikes.
In the offseason, we all heard him say he was coming back because he wasn’t going out like that. I appreciate the desire, but when is enough finally enough? On top of that, he signed a huge contract extension for two more years. So huge, it made him the highest paid player in the league.
On paper, from a purely business perspective, Kobe Bryant does put butts in seats and makes the team a ton of money. But what if he couldn’t play anymore? That’s a lot of money tied up in a guy who isn’t even on the floor! And if he is playing, it isn’t like he is MVP Kobe anymore. He needed some help, and in order to get good help, you have to fork out some bucks to get them. With so much going to Kobe, the Lakers didn’t have enough money to offer all-star free agents, pretty much guaranteeing that the Lakers would suck for the next two years.
At this point, I was pretty pissed at Kobe. The Lakers did suck. 2014-2016’s Laker teams were brutal to watch. His decision wouldn’t look quite as bad, except for the fact that Tim Duncan and Dirk Nowitzki both took substantial pay cuts to allow more talent to be brought on board. Subsequently the Spurs and the Mavs are both still playoff teams, with the Spurs in contention to win the championship nearly every year. My point is, I’ve always been a Kobe defender. Through it all. But this, this was something I couldn’t defend, and it was hamstringing the immediate future of the team.
Did I mention the season after signing the extension he tore his rotator cuff and again had a season-ending surgery? The most cynical portion of me was thinking, well, I hope he takes this as a cue to retire. If 12 year old me knew I had this thought, he would probably try to kick me below the belt. But the writing was on the wall, extension or not. Three seasons, three serious surgeries. We needed to look to the future. I needed to look to the future. Just like I did 20 years earlier.
Kobe vowed to play in the ’15-’16 season, and after a horrid start announced it would be his last. I was relieved for him and myself. He finally admitted that his body was broken down, and couldn’t handle it anymore.
It was sad to watch him. He could barely get enough lift to do a layup. Those impossible shots that he once made at a high clip, now would miss by a mile. Even a normal jump shot would air ball at a much too frequent rate. At times, he would have nice scoring outputs, but never for a substantial amount of time. If it wasn’t for the last game of the year, the highlight of the season would have been the ass-kicking they gave the Warriors one Sunday afternoon. Yes, one of the Warriors 9 losses was to the lowly 17-65 LA Lakers. That was probably the best Lakers game in 3 years.
At the finish line of the season, I didn’t like how I was seemingly pushing Kobe out the door. I realize how stupid that sounds, but in my mind, I was done and over it. And I feel my reasons were sound, even if they were a tad harsh. As his final countdown tour was winding down, I started to feel a twinge of sadness. I started to think, if his last game isn’t on TV, I’m really going to be bummed about not watching more this year. Fortunately it was. That’s when magic happened.
I had no idea what to expect when the Lakers hosted the Jazz
on the final game of the season. The
announcers kept bringing up that MJ scored 15 in his final game. The comparisons would truly last until the
bitter end.
As the game started the phrase “the bitter end” seemed appropriate for the occasion. Kobe went 0-5 with some ugly looking offense. Geez, I may not make it to halftime, were my immediate thoughts. (Those west coast games are hard for an old geezer like me to stay up for) The crowd was hyped though. Those LA crowds can be pretty fickle, but they were anything but that night. Did they make Kobe raise up to the occasion? Or was it his unbreakable will that finally got to shine after three seasons of being dormant? Whatever the case, the shots started to fall. One, then another, and another. Not only was Kobe en fuego but the Lakers were mounting a comeback on a team that just barely missed the playoffs.
If the Lakers could win this game, that would be better than any scoring binge. Holy crap he is draining some three’s now. The crowd is amped, KOBE KOBE KOBE! Once he reached 40, I was a giddy. It may as well have been the 1998 all-star game all over again. What a way for him to go, scoring his heart out just like he always did. Whatever thought of being tired had been in my brain, was long gone now. How was I to know that he was only 2/3 of the way to his destination?
After making his 10th of 12 free throws, Kobe exited the game with a 101-96 win. He had 60 points. The most he had scored in seven years. Sure his teammates kept feeding him the ball. Sure it took 50 shots (that still sounds nuts), but you couldn’t tell anyone at Staples’ Center any different. Had the Lakers still lost the game, I would probably think differently, but you can’t deny a “W.”
After the game, a boat-load of former teammates were there to greet him. I must say this got emotional for me. The obvious guys were there: Shaq, Derek Fisher, Robert Horry, and Rick Fox. But there were some “deep cuts” there that really made me happy. Lamar Odom for one. Not that he is a deep cut, but he has obviously had plenty of problems recently, and it is good just to see him out and about. How about guys like DJ Mbenga, Ronny Turiaff, (cult favorites) and the immortal Adam Morrison? It was too sweet for words. The only guy who was missing was Pau Gasol, but he is still playing, and obviously couldn’t be there. He did have a cool tweet about it though:
— Pau Gasol (@paugasol) April 14, 2016
Now that it is all said and done, I feel really good about
everything. It’s been ugly lately, but
somehow one magical epitomic Kobe performance made it all seem okay in the
end. Kobe said, 20 years went fast. He wasn’t
kidding. What a remarkable career. I may not have been there for the whole
thing, but enough to be completely emotionally invested in it. And what a ride it was.
1996
2016
 |
| courtesy: espn.com |
Comments
Post a Comment