Bryant Effectively Shows What Could Have Been To The Bulls

This would have been Kobe's homecoming had the rumors that peaked a few weeks ago become reality.

This would have been Kobe Bryant's homecoming, had the rumors that peaked a few weeks ago become reality and the Lakers had dealt Bryant to the Chicago Bulls for a package of somebodies, maybes and whatever else might make the dollars balance, if not the exchange of talent.

Every Lakers game has plots and subplots galore, but Sunday's plot twist was almost stranger than truth.

Here was Bryant, who has not publicly rescinded the trade request he made last summer, facing the team he reportedly was willing to leave the Lakers to join.
Would he sulk over not having been traded?

Or would he be especially assertive and try to show the Bulls what they missed out on when their trade talks with the Lakers fizzled?

The conclusion became obvious in the first 7 minutes 13 seconds of the third quarter, when Bryant outscored the Bulls, 9-2.

Bryant finished with a team-high 18 points and had three assists and five rebounds in 32 minutes as the Lakers rode a 61-point second half to a 106-78 win over the Luol Deng-less Bulls. Bryant left Staples Center as he entered it -- a member of the Lakers for now and for the foreseeable future.

He still may be dealt at the trade deadline or next summer, but the immediate chances of a deal between the Lakers and the Bulls have evaporated.

"It's over. It's dead. Dead story," Bulls Coach Scott Skiles said.

Bryant may come to realize that not being traded to Chicago -- or anywhere else -- is the best thing that could have happened to him.

Where else could he go and have a better chance to win another title after his new team trades its top players to get him?

His best chance to win a championship this season may be to stay here, to play as he has been playing, to let the newly confident and productive bench give him a rest and preserve some of the spring in his aging legs.

The evolution and effectiveness of the bench "helps tremendously," said Lamar Odom, who scored nine points in just over 35 minutes.

"And it really helps, of course, Kobe and myself. The last two years I've played a lot of minutes and Kobe has been playing deep in the playoffs for years. It helps when these guys can step up."

Although every indication is that Bryant still wants out, his teammates are glad he's still here and that all the rumors were just talk.

"You know, it was getting a little hectic there for a while," said Luke Walton, one of five Lakers reserves who reached double figures in points.

"I mean, the way the team's playing right now and the way he's playing right now, I think there's no one in the organization who's not happy he's still with the team."

The Lakers are not going to trade him to another team in the West.To get Bryant, the Bulls reportedly would have had to deal Deng, and/or forward Tyrus Thomas, guard Ben Gordon and rookie big man Joakim Noah. Ben Wallace's name showed up at various stages, too, and none of it came to fruition.

"It was talked about incessantly for two or three weeks amongst everyone," Skiles said. "We talked about it all the time with the team and we haven't talked about it in several days now."

Any other East team with enough assets to interest Bryant in waiving his no-trade clause would have to give up a good chunk of those assets to get him. Then, he'd be no closer to a championship than he is here, now, with the Lakers off to a 6-3 start that includes victories over Phoenix, Utah, Houston, Detroit and Chicago.

"I don't see why we can't win with the talent we have," Walton said.

"There's a lot of good teams in the NBA right now, especially in the West, but no one that we feel we can't compete with. I don't see why we can't get something done here."

Bryant was far more cautious in his outlook, as he has been in times of prosperity and famine.He praised the chemistry of the bench players and lauded the team's overall defensive effort in holding an opponent under 100 points for the sixth time in nine games but was hesitant to say how far that might carry them.

"I don't know," he said. "For us, it just depends on staying healthy and continuing to stay focused. You can't get too excited. We had a tough schedule to start the season and still do and we managed to keep our heads above water to this point.

"We can't get excited about it. It's early, still early in the season. We have to stay focused and that's my job, to keep us focused and continue to move forward."

They weren't focused during training camp, as Coach Phil Jackson acknowledged before the game in saying that the trade rumors adversely affected the younger players.

It was, he said, "the insecurity not of a trade so much as of the lack of affection or lack of interest Kobe had for a period of time at the end of camp, a period of time five days or so. They went through a little lull. 'Is he with us or is he not?' "

Bryant is with them now. For how much longer, it's impossible to say. But his best chance to win, like it or not, is here.

by Helene Elliott

LATimes.com

When it Comes To The Bulls, Kobe Beats Them Rather Than Joins Them

LOS ANGELES -- The theme of the night was convergence. Within a three-block radius you had all three Los Angeles obsessions on display Sunday night: cars, celebrities and Kobe.
The crowd gathered outside Staples Center wasn't there because the Lakers were about to play the Chicago Bulls. The fans' eyes were fixated across the street, where pop stars were arriving for the American Music Awards at the new Nokia Theater. Meanwhile, parking garages in the area were at capacity from people attending the L.A. Auto Show at the convention center next door.

Honestly, Lakers vs. Bulls turned out to be the worst entertainment option of the three. Loads of turnovers and missed shots in the Lakers' 106-78 victory, with the only second-half tension stemming from the distinct possibility that Kobe Bryant would personally outscore the Bulls in the third quarter. (After Kobe took an early 9-2 lead, the Bulls wound up winning, 14-10.)
The game's underlying theme and its real intrigue came from the, ahem, convergence of the still-unsatisfied Bryant and the most-discussed trade destination for him, the Bulls. Here was a chance for some one-stop shopping, to gaze down on the court, swap a few uniforms in your mind and imagine a world in which the trade did go down.
In reality, it currently looks as if this is as close as Bryant is going to come to the Bulls. The problem was the Lakers wanted too much initially, while the Bulls offered too little initially, and they never could come close after those disparate starting points.
Publicly, at least, things have cooled off.
"It's over," Bulls coach Scott Skiles said. "It's dead. Dead story."
Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak said: "There's nothing to discuss."
Still, until Bryant recants his trade demand and the Lakers officially take him off the market, nothing can be discounted.
That's why Bulls forward Luol Deng doesn't believe the story's over.
"Nah," he said. "I'm pretty sure every team in the league is talking. I feel that every team that's struggling is trying to get better. That's the way it should be."
With a 2-7 record, the Bulls are definitely among the strugglers, and they're sinking to the point that not even the addition of Bryant would transform them into a championship team. True, Deng didn't play Sunday, still bothered by a sore back he first injured at Phoenix Thursday night. But he would probably have to be included in a trade package that the Lakers would accept, so his absence wouldn't change the scenario. You'd probably also have to subtract Ben Gordon, the Bulls' only consistent scoring threat Sunday night, who finished with a game-high 20 points. So you're left with a group that still has no low-post threat and few easy shots.
It's not simply a matter of the Bulls taking a lot of jump shots. Pro players can knock down open jumpers all night long. But the Bulls usually take contested jump shots. And the detailed stats some teams keep show that percentages drop dramatically when the shooter has a hand in his face. The Bulls' 38.3 field goal shooting percentage is the lowest in the league.
Bryant could draw double-teams and create open shots for his teammates. But you don't acquire Kobe Bryant to turn him into a playmaker. You bring him in to be the primary scorer and to address Chicago's other glaring deficiency, the lack of a go-to guy in crunch time. That didn't even come into play Sunday, since the Bulls trailed by15 points at the start of the fourth quarter and by 28 when it ended, and the Lakers only played Bryant for three of the final 12 minutes.

Meanwhile, the Lakers' supposed weakness -- everyone not named Bryant -- is looking stronger every game. In fact, the Lakers' second unit (and Phil Jackson prefers to play them as a separate unit, subbing five guys in at once) is turning into one of the best in the league.
Five Laker reserves scored in double figures Sunday, and the Laker bench produced 73 points. That's on the heels of their strong performance (led by Jordan Farmar) against the Pistons Friday night which helped the Lakers cap off a surprising week that saw them go 2-1 in a stretch against San Antonio, Houston and Detroit.
Yes, Tracy McGrady went out with an injury in the second quarter of the Lakers' victory over the Rockets, and Chauncey Billups didn't play for the Pistons. But the end result is the Lakers are 6-3, in the upper half of the Western Conference. It's hard to imagine a realistic trade that would put Bryant or the Lakers in a better situation.
Here's another indication the Lakers are the best location for Bryant, at least until he can wander as a free agent in 2009: while the trade rumors appeared to weigh on the Bulls, the young Lakers kept their heads. If anything, they've been inspired to play better.
Skiles, quite candidly, said the Kobe talk was discussed within the Bulls' locker room as much as anywhere else. "It was talked about incessantly for two and three weeks," Skiles said. "Even with the team. We would talk about it all of the time. And we haven't talked about it for several days now …
"It's one of those unfortunate things about our business where stories get out there. Generally there's some grain of truth in them. Sometimes there isn't. We care about all of our guys on one hand. On the other hand, you've got to toughen up and be able to play through it."
That's what the Lakers did.
"The coach has done a great job, and everybody seems to have worked through the distractions and now they're playing well as a team," Kupchak said.
Since the only Laker who was discussed in trades was the guy who requested it, the issue Phil Jackson saw among his players was "not of the trade, so much as the lack of affection or lack of interest that Kobe had for a period of time. They went through a little lull: 'Is he with us or is he not?'"
There he was in the Lakers' locker room Sunday, saying he was "impressed" with the Lakers' results so far, even if he isn't ready to proclaim them championship contenders. He singled out Andrew Bynum, who had his fourth double-double of the season with 14 points and 10 rebounds.
He even joked about a Chicago newspaper report that he was buying Michael Jordan's house in the northern suburbs.
"I actually thought about purchasing it, decided not to," Bryant said. "I like Oprah's penthouse instead."
He doesn't make enough money to live in Oprah's house. And as talented and skilled as he is, he is not good enough to make any team's situation better just by showing up. Unlike, say, Beyonce, who joined Sugarland for a countrified version of "Irreplaceable" during the American Music Awards and turned it out.
Now that's convergence.

by J.A. Adande

ESPN.COM

Team Effort Carries Lakers

LOS ANGELES -- We arrived at Staples Center not on a mission of simple healing but with the goal of complete resuscitation.
We were going to perform CPR on a story marked RIP, doing so PDQ.
But Chicago coach Scott Skiles first performed a little action of his own, and it wasn't mouth-to-mouth. It was foot-to-throat.
"It's over," he announced with the certainty of a coroner's inked signature. "It's dead. It's a dead story."
Dead? Dead doesn't work in the rumor business. Dead is the absolute last way to go. Dead is a killer.
Truth is Kobe Bryant-to-the-Bulls has been bull for a while now. Any trade wind in that direction is just hot air circulating. If Chicago is going to get a Kobe from the Lakers any time soon it will be Coby Karl.
But something that isn't going to happen — at least until further notice — is still more interesting than what did happen Sunday, specifically a mid-November NBA game decided by 28 points.
(This is particularly true when the Lakers produce a first quarter as they did against the Bulls, with nine turnovers compared to six field goals, with no one capable of stopping Andres Nocioni, with Kwame Brown going down to knee and ankle injuries.
Said Coach Phil Jackson afterward: "That first half was really a difficult half for us. I'm surprised the crowd was still there when we started the second half.")
Anyway, deaths have been declared prematurely before, so we pressed on, knowing a column on anything Kobe would be read more than a column on everything anybody else.
Face it, if the Lakers trade Bryant, they immediately become as intriguing as the Utah Jazz, a franchise as sterile as the state it plays in. Depending on the deal, they actually could be a better team. No way, though, are they as fun a team.
And this game was a layup for us, Bryant's current team against his former future one. This was Jackson then and now. This was Bryant as — more literally than ever — the second coming of Michael Jordan.
"We haven't talked about it in several days now," Skiles said. "But we talked about it incessantly for weeks. Even within the team we talked about every day."
The Lakers talked about it, too, in case you forgot about Bryant's radio rants and Jerry Buss' lulu in Honolulu.
They talked about it more Sunday, during the morning shootaround. Jackson said he discussed with Bryant the need to avoid trying to do too much right at the start.
In response, Bryant did nothing. At halftime, he had two field goals and eight points despite being guarded by Adrian Griffin, Thomas Gardner and Thabo Sefolosha. And not all at the same time.
The Bulls were without injured forward Luol Deng, a development Skiles said robbed his team of its "small chance to do something against Kobe." He started Griffin and assigned him to Bryant, calling the move "a little bit unfair to Griff."
So given a half in which he disappeared almost as well as Lamar Odom regularly does, Bryant was making himself a viable story here. He was misplaying right into our eager hands.
But then the third quarter arrived, Bryant awoke to do enough to blend into the rest of the night and the Lakers buried the Bulls with their bench for goodness sakes.
At the end, Bryant wasn't playing for either team, instead sitting for the Lakers, laughing it up while something named Aaron Gray was scoring perhaps the least significant layup in NBA history.
It was garbage time, the trash being where all this Kobe-versus-Chicago hype and anticipation ended up Sunday.
"As far as I'm concerned," Odom said, "he's happy here now."
Following the game, all everyone wanted to talk about was the Lakers bench, and reserve players generally are as interesting as tire ads. Immediately afterward, they interviewed Jordan Farmar on the television and Chris Mihm on the radio, while Bryant exited silently.
Later, in the locker room, Mihm said something about the Lakers subs "stepping up," about the fact this is "a very deep team," about how this sort of bench production is possible "on any given night."
Nearby, Odom said: "Everybody's confident in here. Everybody's ready to play at any given time."
Finally, Bryant emerged and was asked four consecutive questions about the Lakers reserves.
When he was asked if he had anything to say concerning the Bulls, Bryant responded, "No, I don't."
Dead? Put it this way, by the end of the night, doornails were sending their condolences.
The Bulls have departed town and Bryant will leave today — on the Lakers' flight to Indianapolis.
We failed to breathe life back into the beast. For now, the Lakers are just about basketball.
Can't have that, no way. So how about this? Just for your ears, Mihm-to-the-Bulls.

by Jeff Miller
OCRegister

The Subtle Difference Between Kobe and T-Mac

There are two ways to look at this season's opening night matchup between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Houston Rockets:
Rockets 95 - Lakers 93
or
Kobe 45 - T-Mac 30
However you choose to look at it, they will face each other again Wednesday night in Houston. What a great opportunity to compare and contrast two of the top scorers in the NBA.
Watch almost any game Kobe Bryant plays, and what he is becomes evident pretty quickly - an aggressive, attacking scorer, with so many different ways to make a play it is almost impossible to defend him with matchups or schemes. Inside, outside, in transition, in the halfcourt, off the dribble, off a cut, in the post - you name it. The scouting report reads: Watch Out For Everything!
Although Kobe plays in the Lakers version of the triangle offense, he will frequently bail out of that three-sided ship and take on the whole defense by himself - and often with great success. He is fearless against any defender or defensive scheme, and will take on the whole team in the lane or at the rim. In any given game you may not see him score the same way twice.
In just the first quarter against Houston on opening night, Kobe took these shots:
- Catch and shoot jumper from a handoff at the top of the key - Sweeping right handed sky hook off an elbow handoff - Back to the basket spin move from the left elbow for a right-handed lay-up in traffic - Transition jumper at the left elbow extended - Transition hesitation drive from the right wing for a foul - Catch-and-shoot three-pointer from the left wing - Transition hesitation crossover - left-handed runner - Steal, breakaway lay-up for a foul - Catch-and-shoot jumper from the top of the key off a curl cut - Curl cut, catch and drive, behind the back dribble shot fake for a foul - Transition hesitation crossover dribble jumper - Crossover - split the trap - left-hand lay-up off the high ball screen
That's just in one quarter - good luck defending that for 48 minutes.
Tracy McGrady also has great versatility. He can score in transition, hit the jumper, drive and create, and post up. Whereas the Lakers run their triangle and allow Kobe to pick his spots, Houston seems to run more sets to get McGrady the ball in certain situations.
He will get lots of ballscreens on the wing and on the top of the key from Yao to get free on the dribble. When he hasn't had the ball in his hands in a few possessions, Houston will run the classic "single/double" to allow McGrady to catch and shoot off the screen. They will also dive him into the post and isolate him on a smaller defender.
Sometimes the Rockets will start T-Mac down in the post, and the action will begin with the point guard passing to the high post at the elbow. The guard cuts off the outside shoulder of the high post, then down screens for McGrady - who cuts off the post, gets the handoff, and drives to the foul line area. Getting T-Mac to the middle on the dribble is a common theme of Houston's action for him.
In another set, Yao Ming and McGrady will set up on opposite elbows. The point guard feeds McGrady, cuts off his outside hip, then Yao comes across the foul line to set a ballscreen - again allowing for T-Mac to dribble to the middle of the foul line area.
The Lakers take advantage of Kobe's versatility and creativity by allowing him to freelance within their system; the Rockets use McGrady's in a more systematic and structured way.
One interesting aspect of this matchup is McGrady rarely guards Bryant, but Kobe defends McGrady a significant amount of the game. The Rockets will start with Shane Battier on Bryant, then rotate as many as three and four players to guard him throughout the game. Luke Walton and Kobe share the duties of guarding T-Mac.
At the defensive end, Kobe relishes the challenge of guarding Tracy McGrady. Kobe gets up in him, picks him up full-court, denies him the ball, and contests hard on every shot. While T-Mac seems to accept this challenge, Kobe lives for these confrontations.
When Kobe has to guard a lesser player, he appears almost disinterested. But when he is matched with McGrady, you can see him come alive - aggressively challenging every move, being physical, and daring T-Mac to try and beat him. He competes hard and concedes nothing.
When McGrady does find himself guarding Kobe, Bryant smells blood and goes right at him. On one possession in their first meeting, T-Mac switched onto Kobe on a ballscreen. As soon as Kobe saw this, he backed out, stared McGrady down, then went between the legs, behind the back, then between the legs again and blew by McGrady. T-Mac "matadored" it and just swiped at the ball trying to get the strip.
On another occasion, Kobe had just jumped in and stolen a pass at the elbow, and was racing to the basket on the dribble with McGrady chasing. The fans were expecting a confrontation at the rim - dunk, hard foul, etc. Instead, McGrady just conceded the rim and swiped down hard at the ball - committing the foul.
T-Mac doesn't appear to want to challenge Kobe when faced with guarding him. He seems content to lay back, bail out, or just try to get a strip.
And maybe that's the true difference between these two great players. Both are versatile, creative, and can score in so many different ways. However, Kobe is also among the best in the league at both ends of the floor, while McGrady deosn't seem to have the desire to really mix it up on the defensive end. You don't hear T-Mac mentioned in the same sentence with "Killer Instinct" and "Rip Your Heart Out." Kobe should wear those on the front of his jersey.
It's that difference in mentality that may be the biggest contrast of all, and what makes Kobe arguably the best player in the game and McGrady merely a talented All-Star who can't advance in the playoffs.
However, this season T-Mac is playing with the best supporting cast of his life. So, this may put him in his best position to go deep into the playoffs - which is the real showcase for the game's best players.
And that is a stage on which Kobe Bryant has already shined.

by Mike Moreau
HOOPSWORLD

All or Nothing with Kobe

Kobe Bryant is a lot of things; competitive, determined, passionate, hardworking, mentally tough, and he plays with the heart of a lion. He’s also immature, dramatic, arrogant, selfish, and lacks loyalty; just to name a few. But most importantly, he’s the Lakers best chance to win a championship.
There were a ton of questions heading into the 2007-2008 season, but Kobe has already answered the biggest on-court question surrounding him. Will he put his heart and soul into this team? He has answered that with a definitive yes.
Now the ball is in owner Jerry Buss’ court. Will Kobe remain a Laker? And for how long? A lot of things factor into how Buss is feeling right now, but make no mistake about it; Jerry Buss is hurt by his star player’s comments this past off-season. Buss has stuck by Bryant through the hardest of times on the court (problems with Shaquille O’Neal) and off the court (legal problems in Colorado), and he’s paying him over $19 million this year, so he has every right to feel betrayed by a son-like figure who he has supported for the past 12 years.
Fortunately this isn’t Match.com or E-Harmony; this is basketball. And the owner and star player don’t have to be on good terms in order to win basketball games.
That is why the Lakers need to come out and say they won’t be trading Kobe Bryant. Not now, not ever. And if that’s a little white lie and they still want to listen to offers as it nears the date of his 2009 opt-out clause, that’s fine, just do it behind closed doors.
Of course this strategy involves risk. What if Kobe opts-out in 2009 and the Lakers get nothing in return for him? The following is an excerpt from what ESPN’s Chris Broussard had to say about this particular topic. He points out that Kobe leaving without the Lakers getting anything in return might not be the worst scenario in the world…
“It’s not like a lot of teams will have the cap room to sign Kobe for $20 million plus per year, certainly not many good teams that are ready to compete for a championship.
Obviously, he’s a great talent, but rather than get chumped in a sign-and-trade deal, why not just let his $21 million roll off their payroll? Lamar Odom’s contract will end that year as well, giving the Lakers plenty of cap room to work with.
Remember, LeBron will be able to opt-out of his deal the year after that in 2010. If Cleveland can’t put the right pieces around him, who’s to say LeBron won’t be ready to go rejuvenate the Lakers.”
We all know that Buss is an avid poker player, so my message to Buss is to stop all of this non-sense and go “all-in.” And if Bryant comes out and says he’ll enact his opt-out clause, then call him on it (not literally Jerry, keep your mouth shut please).
Two years from now is long time in basketball years, and there are a ton of unknowns: Will Kobe at 31 years-old really want to start all over with a new team? Will the young Lakers be a contender? Will Andrew Bynum mature into a consistent, powerful player? And I would think the Lakers would make a splash in the free-agent market in one of the next two years (Jermaine O’Neal and Gilbert Arenas might be pipe dreams at this point, but both have said they will opt-out after this season).
Buss went all-in with Kobe when he was a free agent back in 2004. It’s time to do it again.

by Justin Page
LakerNation.com

The NBA’s Gatsby

The other night I went to my first Lakers game in a long time. I was extremely excited, as I hadn’t seen Kobe play on anything but a television since he was with Shaq and I was about 10 or 11.
That night, I saw something from Kobe that enlightened my perception of him. He played fantastically, scoring 28 points while making more than half of his shots. Still, I couldn’t help but focus on was what he had failed to do. The Hornets had been leading almost the whole game, with Chris Paul going to the future and dishing out 21 assists and Peja Stojakovic going to the past and dropping 10-13 from three point land. With around seven minutes left in the fourth and the Lakers down by only a half-dozen, Kobe returned to the game. For much of it, he had mixed distributing the ball with flurries of scoring. Now it was his time to tear out the other team’s heart.
To my surprise, that’s not what happened. Kobe was passive for a few possessions, fired off a few off-balance jumpers, and then watched as the Hornets ran off with the game. I think he may have driven to the basket once. On the way home, I thought about what I’d just seen, as well as everything else that had happened to Kobe since Shaq left- the low win totals, the failure to get out of the first round, the meltdown in Game 7 of the ’06 playoffs against the Suns- and had myself a revelation.
While Kobe may be human basketball perfection, he was never given a divine mandate for greatness.
Kobe is basketball’s answer to Jay Gatsby.

Gatsby was once Jim Gatz, a successful man who nobody ever said would be great, a soldier in World War I, part of the ultimate team victory. But then he met Daisy Buchanon, and in his romance with her saw that no normal man, however successful, would ever have her all to himself. Daisy could only be wooed by greatness. So Gatz, singularly driven to claim his holy grail, reinvented himself through hard work and sheer force of will into Jay Gatsby, the ultra-wealthy and mysterious baron of West Egg, armed now with everything he needed to obtain that which haunted him. But Daisy never became his. Gatsby was left to look into the window while Daisy shared cold fried chicken with Tom Buchanon, the racist, cheating, unpleasant man who was destined to have her for reasons that Gatsby did not understand, and never could.
Men who end up with girls like Daisy are not made, but ordained.
So it is with Kobe.
Like Gatsby, Kobe was highly successful as a mortal, getting three rings in Shaq’s shadow and gaining a reputation as one of the NBA’s best players. A hyper-athletic slasher who played great defense and was a crucial part of a championship team. Like Gatsby, Kobe was unsatisfied by the trappings of mortality. As Gatsby was seduced by Daisy, Kobe was seduced by the glory of being the next Jordan, a man whose mere presence on the court meant championships. And so Kobe devoted himself completely to joining the NBA’s Valhalla of Champions, pushing Shaq out to make the team his own and working tirelessly to turn himself from a fantastic if incomplete slasher to the perfect basketball machine, then waited for the world to bend to his will.
To his chagrin, that’s not the way it happened at all.
Kobe’s team, and by proxy him, has never broken through to greatness, and he was forced to watch from his couch while Shaq- fat, lazy, arrogant Shaq- ate cold fried chicken with the Jim O’ Brien Trophy. Just as Gatsby felt that Tom never deserved Daisy, Kobe will go to his grave believing that Shaq never earned his success. But just as Gatsby failed to understand that Tom’s knowledge of Daisy’s world could never be acquired artificially, Kobe will never understand what it is that makes Shaq, Jordan, Duncan and the rest so great.
It’s an understanding of how and when to make your teammates better and when to take the game over yourself, a sense of the game’s flow that cannot be taught, even by Phil Jackson, that Kobe has over and over again proven to lack in his doomed quest for immortality. Just as Gatsby felt his money meant nothing if it did not bring him Daisy, Kobe feels he will never be complete without a ring tainted by Shaq.
Kobe’s personality even seems to mirror Gatsby’s. For all of their outward charisma, something inside them makes them impossible to connect with, and both have ended up alone in their worlds despite their apparent friendliness. (Can’t you just see Kobe calling Andrew Bynum “Old Sport?”) And just as Gatsby was nagged by rumors that he made his money in unseemly ways, Kobe will always be haunted by the rumor that it was his own hubris that chased Shaq out of town, as well as the happenings at Eagle, Colorado.
Love or hate Kobe, he remains one of the NBA’s most interesting characters, and the doomed hero of the Lakers continues to put up 50-point games against the current while being back borne ceaselessly into the past.

by John Krolik
SportsHubLA

Making A Case For Keeping And Trading Kobe

Kobe Bryant, Provocateur.

Say what you will about the Lakers great's motives, ego or lack of loyalty, he remains one of basketball's most gifted players. Express-News NBA writer Mike Monroe breaks down Bryant's stated desire that the Lakers trade him.
The case for keeping Kobe
Fair Value as Fantasy: When there is bad blood in the water, NBA sharks circle. Nobody is going to give Lakers owner Jerry Buss fair value for Bryant when Buss is deemed desperate to deal him.
81 Points: When Wilt Chamberlain's 100-point game is the only one ahead of you on the NBA's list of "Most Points, Single Game," you are worth keeping, if only for the box office appeal.
Bruce Bowen in Purple: Because Bryant is such a great scorer, few who aren't true basketball experts recognize that he is one of the league's great defenders. Ask any of the international players he locked up while he represented Team USA over the summer.
The case for trading Kobe
Happy Is as Happy Does: Bryant pouted through training camp, possibly feigning minor injuries so he could sit out sessions. He has seemed uninterested at times, even unwilling to shoot. This can't be good.
A Deal Worth Making?: Should the Bulls decide, probably as the trade deadline nears, they can part with Luol Deng, Ben Gordon, Tyrus Thomas and Andres Nocioni to get Bryant, the Lakers can rebuild nicely around those four and Andrew Bynum.
The Nuisance Factor: Buss and the Lakers' organization have stood by Bryant through his trying personal times and endured criticisms planted through media sycophants. Everyone has a breaking point. Mitch Kupchak probably is past his. Buss could be getting close.
Bottom Line Unhappy or not, Bryant leads the NBA in scoring, at 30.6 points per game. He's averaging 7.6 rebounds and 5.0 assists and plays lock-down defense. Despite the opening-night boos at Staples Center, he is still L.A.'s most popular sports figure. Dr. Buss can't trade him unless he gets fair value. That won't be possible until the trade deadline nears, no matter what you read on the Internet.

by Mike Monroe

MySA.Com