May
29
Latest Kobe Bryant Controversy Is Nothing New Considering Number-24’s Massive Ego!
So it appears that Kobe Bryant was only suggesting that he would like to see Jerry West return to the Los Angeles Lakers and will not request a trade if West does not return to La La Land, where he was pushed out after the 2000 season in large part by Phil Jackson. It had been reported that Bryant had told ESPN’s Ric Bucher that he would request a trade if West, who is leaving the Memphis Grizzlies this summer, did not come back to the Lakers, which has floundered in the post Shaq-era under General Manager Mitch Kupchak, or as the great Dave Smith of Sporting News Radio calls him, Mitch Cupcake. West, of course, was the Lakers’ General Manager during the title runs with the Showtime Lakers of the eighties until early this decade.
With that said, Bryant’s alleged words caused some excitement here in Chicago, where Bryant apparently shopped for a home while a free agent in the summer of 2004. Who else but the Sun-Times’ resident jackass Jay Mariotti wrote that the Bulls should try to pursue a trade for Bryant this summer. While Bryant is most likely going nowhere, the dim-witted Mariotti once again needs a new light bulb. Bryant is the last player that the Bulls should consider and the very antithesis of the type of players that John Paxson has used to help restore respectability in this city of six basketball championships.
Without a doubt in my mind, Bryant is the most talented, all-around player in the game. He has been for quite a while. When it comes to individual talent, I’d take him ahead of anyone else in the league. Chicago certainly needs a superstar scorer on its team and Bryant would fill that bill.
With that said, Bryant is selfish, pompous and a fake human being. He’s the type of player that would screw up the team-first attitude that has made the Bulls so enjoyable during the past three seasons.
Bryant is and has always been about one thing: Kobe Bryant. His immaturity at this point in his career is astonishing, especially when considering how Bryant’s career has gone the exact opposite of the player that he’s been so-often compared to: Michael Jordan.
It took Michael Jordan seven years to win a championship. Those seven years included a lot of growing up for Jordan, who did not trust his teammates and was a spoiled brat himself early in his career. When Jordan finally came to accept his teammates and become a team player, the Bulls took off and never stopped. Jordan won six titles in eight years and cemented himself as not only the greatest player in the sport but also the greatest competitor of all time. Even more important, Jordan made his teammates better, even when they were marginal players (see the 1998 Bulls’ championship squad).
As for Bryant, he came out of high school and arrived on a Lakers’ team that had just acquired Shaquille O’Neal in his prime via free agency. Bryant won three titles in his first six years in the league and showed what a great individual player he was. During that time, he and Shaq feuded often, with the blame going to the immaturity of both players. With that said, when Bryant helped get Shaq traded out of Los Angeles after the Lakers—featuring the likes of Karl Malone and Gary Payton—were embarrassed by the Pistons in the 2004 NBA Finals, it was his time to carry the team, something he said he could do for years to come.
At that point, Bryant was entering his ninth season and as he enters his 12th season, he has shown that he can not shoulder the load of being a superstar and a leader. While Bryant has exploded during his three years away from Shaq on the offensive side of the ball, he’s the same old Kobe that he’s always been. Shoot first and pass the blame, and not the ball, to everyone else.
Despite having three championships in his career, Bryant has used these years away from Shaq to showcase himself above everything else. He has gone off for 81 points, put crazy strings of 50-point games together and accomplished many other individual goals. However, in terms of the team, Bryant’s failed to make anyone better and be a leader. The Lakers have failed to advance past the first round with the great Kobe as their numero uno.
While his career at this point should be about winning championships, Bryant enjoys the role of being able to defer to no one but himself and solely showcase his skills. He loves the fact that some have called him better than Jordan, and to be honest with you, I don’t think he cares if the Lakers lose in the first round every year.
His sabotage of Game Seven against the Phoenix Suns during last season’s playoffs is a perfect example. When he should of took over that game at a time when his team needed him to, Bryant deferred and barely shot in the second half of that game. It was as if Bryant was once again showing how the Lakers are nothing without him at a time when he needed to play like a Jordan and solely concentrate on taking over the game and getting the win.
I find it funny that every off-season Bryant says he wants the Lakers to get better. This is just Kobe doing what he’s always done, saying the right thing to bolster his image of the golden boy. When he entered the league, Bryant seemed so calculated in what he said. He always rubbed me the wrong way as trying to sound like Jordan, who became the master of saying the politically correct thing.
Thus, Bryant’s words should not come as a surprise. He was an only child, a spoiled brat to say the least, and he is only craving attention once again. It’s the only way Kobe can get attention nowadays this late in the playoffs.
So if Kobe were to become available (which he is not going to as he will never leave the Lakers since he is the perfect representation of fakeness and glamour in Tinsel Town), the Bulls should not pursue him. It’s not worth selling your soul for someone like Bryant, despite all of his talent. I’d rather see them go for a player with a sordid past like a Zach Randolph than a player like Bryant (who also has a sordid past but has been Teflon in being able to have that aspect of his life be completely swept under the rug by the forgetful NBA).
Bryant would look good on paper for a team like Chicago but would be a disaster on the court. Scott Skiles has had his problems with Ben Wallace at times this past season, and Bryant would have Skiles at wit’s end and probably resigning before the end of the season.
Any Bulls’ fan who understands the NBA realizes two things:
• Bryant is not going anywhere with Jerry Buss in love with him; and
• He’s the last player that you would ever want to see on the Bulls.
I’ll take the Bulls staying pat with what they have rather than going after Kobe Bryant and sacrificing the values that have made this current rendition fun to root for!
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