Speaker 1: Diversion podcasts. But I think the main thing is getting
Speaker 1: in shape. From what I hear is a very long table,
Speaker 1: a lot of basketball to be played, not a bump
Speaker 1: in the ground. So I had to bring myself. I'm
Speaker 1: getting shaped. It's my legs. When get times, I know,
Speaker 1: I know it's liberties nowadays started tend to hit a
Speaker 1: hit a wall in the middle of the season. I
Speaker 1: think a lot of the great players in the past
Speaker 1: and magic might but I don't think they've everged that wall.
Speaker 1: I want to hit that wall. I work hard because
Speaker 1: I possibly can do something. I still hit the wall,
Speaker 1: and we to work even harder. Next shot. Looking as
Speaker 1: a positive map, but better field. But what's going on?
Speaker 1: During this series, We've dive deep into Kobe Bryant's early life.
Speaker 1: We've talked about his family, his upbringing, his social life
Speaker 1: when he was a teenager, his decision to skip college
Speaker 1: and go straight from Lower Merion High School to the NBA.
Speaker 1: We've talked a lot about him as a person, which
Speaker 1: is a natural thing to do. Kobe was famous. Kobe
Speaker 1: was a mega celebrity. Kobe's photo could appear on the
Speaker 1: cover of People magazine, and everyone in the supermarket checkout
Speaker 1: line would recognize him. You didn't have to know anything
Speaker 1: about basketball to know who he was. But in this episode,
Speaker 1: we wanted to home in on Kobe as a basketball player.
Speaker 1: That's what that tape you heard at the top of
Speaker 1: this episode is all about. It's from the summer of
Speaker 1: and Kobe is talking about how he's preparing himself physically
Speaker 1: for the n b A. He says he doesn't want
Speaker 1: to hit that wall. He doesn't want to tire himself
Speaker 1: out completely before the uler season is finished. Magic Johnson
Speaker 1: didn't do that, Michael Jordan didn't do that, and Kobe
Speaker 1: didn't want to do it either. Here's the thing, though,
Speaker 1: he kind of did. At the end of that ninety
Speaker 1: seven season, in an elimination game against the Utah Jazz,
Speaker 1: Kobe had one of the worst games of his career,
Speaker 1: maybe the worst. He shot four air balls in the
Speaker 1: closing minutes. His legs were gone. He had hit that
Speaker 1: wall holder right, John rootns great A second glass? Why
Speaker 1: God about Ruth Wilton five second class four, Bryan God
Speaker 1: pull up not all the way? Rob Over and Bob
Speaker 1: gold Overdove, Doctor Hallover, High Scord TB Slet, Carl prober
Speaker 1: baball porn, plafer hall, a clock colver cover believe. Of course,
Speaker 1: we know Kobe eventually figured out how to break through
Speaker 1: that wall. He made the All Star Game the following season,
Speaker 1: and four years later, when the Lakers won their second
Speaker 1: championship with him, he actually averaged more points per game
Speaker 1: and shot a better percentage from the field in the
Speaker 1: playoffs than he did during the regular season. Safe to
Speaker 1: say his conditioning was better by then. So for this episode,
Speaker 1: we really wanted to drill down on the physical and
Speaker 1: mental attributes that made him great on the court, the
Speaker 1: granular stuff that basketball junkies love, and we thought a
Speaker 1: cool way to do it would be to examine each
Speaker 1: stage of his life and career through the eyes of
Speaker 1: someone who knew Kobe well at each stage. So we
Speaker 1: have three coaches with ties to Kobe to break everything down. First,
Speaker 1: you'll hear from Ashley Howard, who grew up with Kobe
Speaker 1: and played against him when they were kids. He had
Speaker 1: been Jay Wright's top assistant code on two national championship
Speaker 1: teams at Villanova, and now he's the head coach at
Speaker 1: Lasau University. As we have a new man in charge
Speaker 1: overs for the first of in fourteen years. Ashley Howard
Speaker 1: will be the new coach at LASAL that was announced today.
Speaker 1: He will be the nineteenth head coach in the program's history.
Speaker 1: For the last five seasons, Howard was one of Jay
Speaker 1: Wright's top assistants and recruiters. In that time, Villanova won
Speaker 1: two national championships and said an n C double, a
Speaker 1: record for most wins in a four year span. Howard
Speaker 1: also spent four years as an assistant at LASAL, and
Speaker 1: he says that gives him an advantage. Then, in the
Speaker 1: second part of this episode, you'll hear from Temple University
Speaker 1: head coach Aaron McKee, who played thirteen seasons in the NBA.
Speaker 1: Aaron finished his career with the Lakers. He was Kobe's
Speaker 1: teammate there for two years, but before that he had
Speaker 1: to guard him a couple of times each season and
Speaker 1: throughout the two thousand one NBA Finals, when Kobe's Lakers
Speaker 1: beat Aaron's seventy sixers, we're carrying from dog to record.
Speaker 1: Ki Shockin's last show four games lost Whitehers Well by
Speaker 1: today shuck up. Finally, in the last part of this episode,
Speaker 1: you'll hear from Brett Brown. Brett has known Kobe for
Speaker 1: a long time and in a lot of ways he
Speaker 1: gained planned against it and got to coach him in
Speaker 1: two NBA All Star Games when Brett was an assistant
Speaker 1: under Greg Popovich with the San Antonio Spurs. He coached
Speaker 1: against Kobe in the Olympics when Kobe was on the
Speaker 1: US team and Brett was the head coach of the
Speaker 1: Australian team and Brett was the Sixers head coach when
Speaker 1: Kobe played his final game in Philadelphia in December two
Speaker 1: thousand fifteen. He's a showman and a showtime surprise. We
Speaker 1: knew he was Commas and something a little extra tonight
Speaker 1: no matter what is transpired in the first sixteen oh
Speaker 1: and he has another connection to Kobe. Brett's son, Sam
Speaker 1: is a junior at Lower Merion and one of the
Speaker 1: top basketball players in the Philadelphia area. In this episode,
Speaker 1: we want to give you a sense of just how
Speaker 1: Kobe's presence and legend linger in the present day, how
Speaker 1: fresh they still are in so many ways. There is
Speaker 1: relevant as they've ever been, and I've ever said, Wow,
Speaker 1: what fress up about this young little guy? And a
Speaker 1: little did I know Bryant? Another crazy drains they're loving
Speaker 1: this show. From Kobe Bryant, I'm Mike Sealsky, and from
Speaker 1: Diversion Podcasts, this is I am Kobe le Bratley. Create
Speaker 1: Myself Yourself, say nice on Create Yourself. You gotta great
Speaker 1: minds that we gain getting time. Episode eleven, Tricks of
Speaker 1: the Basketball Trade. If you're up on Philly basketball history
Speaker 1: or have been paying close attention throughout this series, you
Speaker 1: might have already figured out there's a deeper connection between
Speaker 1: Ashley Howard and Kobe Bryant than what I explained in
Speaker 1: the introduction. Just pay attention to Ashley's last name, Howard. Yep,
Speaker 1: he's the son of Mo Howard, Joe Bryant's buddy from
Speaker 1: high school, who we've heard from across several episodes. I'm
Speaker 1: that Kobe, all right when he first moved to the
Speaker 1: States from Italy. You know, our parents were close to
Speaker 1: My father and Joe, his father, were childhood friends. Ashley
Speaker 1: how where it is in his fourth season as lasal's
Speaker 1: men's basketball coach, and I drove down to campus in
Speaker 1: late November to sit down and talk with him about Kobe.
Speaker 1: Ashley hasn't had a winning season yet, and he's still
Speaker 1: facing challenges similar to the ones that his storied predecessor,
Speaker 1: Speedy Morris faced back when he was trying to coax
Speaker 1: Kobe to become an explorer. Budget constraints, a relative lack
Speaker 1: of resources, etcetera, etcetera. Even the men's basketball Coaches office
Speaker 1: is just as modest as it was way back when
Speaker 1: I was a student there. It looks pretty much the
Speaker 1: same as it did when it was Speedy's office in
Speaker 1: the early nineteen nineties. Back then, Ashley considered Kobe one
Speaker 1: of his basketball role models. He was two years younger
Speaker 1: than Kobe, and the two of them played in the
Speaker 1: Sunny Hill League at the same time. The Sunny Hill
Speaker 1: League was the training ground for adolescent basketball talent in
Speaker 1: and around Philadelphia. People call Sunny the mayor of basketball
Speaker 1: in Philly, and he founded the league in the late
Speaker 1: nineteen sixties. The games were at Old McGonagall Hall on
Speaker 1: Temple's campus. If you were a promising young player, that
Speaker 1: was where you went to be seen, and it helped
Speaker 1: you build your reputation and get into the good pickup
Speaker 1: games at the city's rec centers. One of those games
Speaker 1: still stands out to Ashley. Kobe was about thirteen at
Speaker 1: the time, so Ashley would have been about eleven, and
Speaker 1: they were playing against each other at Justine Lake Recreation
Speaker 1: Center in the East Falls section of Philadelphia. I remember
Speaker 1: I had a breakaway lay up. Kobe was chasing me
Speaker 1: down and I just jumped stop and he flew over
Speaker 1: top of me and I laid the ball in or
Speaker 1: run down the court, and he said to me, I
Speaker 1: gave you that one. I gave you that one. So
Speaker 1: that was one of my first memories of Kobe. Because
Speaker 1: the Bryant and Howard families were so close, Ashley got
Speaker 1: to know Kobe pretty well when they were kids. And
Speaker 1: because Ashley was a darn good player himself. He went
Speaker 1: on to play Division One ball at Drexel University. He
Speaker 1: got an up close look at Kobe's growth as a
Speaker 1: player during his teenage years morning and that growth was unusual,
Speaker 1: to say the least. Kobe picked up on things, especially
Speaker 1: from his father and from his sisters Shariah and Shaya,
Speaker 1: both of whom were excellent athletes themselves. When Joe played
Speaker 1: in the NBA and internationally. For example, Kobe noticed that
Speaker 1: he always iced his knees and joints after every practicing game,
Speaker 1: and when his sisters played volleyball, they always wore knee pads,
Speaker 1: so he did the same thing. He was so skinny
Speaker 1: that he looked like a giraffe wearing a knight's armor.
Speaker 1: Used to wear his kneepads, and he used to ice
Speaker 1: his body up like after he played. And we would
Speaker 1: look at Augustine Lake like, yo, what is this guy doing?
Speaker 1: Like he was like fourteen years old and his body's
Speaker 1: wrapped up in ice. But like I guess like he
Speaker 1: saw that when he was a kid playing. You know
Speaker 1: why his dad overseas and like, okay, after you play,
Speaker 1: you like your body up. You take care of your body,
Speaker 1: take care of your you know, you know, you protect
Speaker 1: your knees. And that's what was different about Kobe. That's
Speaker 1: where you saw like the experience of being around his father,
Speaker 1: being around his uncle Chubby, guys that played the game
Speaker 1: at an extremely high level, guys that were pros, and
Speaker 1: he was just analyzing and dissecting their every move and
Speaker 1: um and learning just from being around the game at
Speaker 1: a high level. Just what actually saw really was the
Speaker 1: foundation of Kobe's game, the substructure that would support all
Speaker 1: the other skills that would make him great. Remember we
Speaker 1: played together in UM like a Philadelphia and New York game.
Speaker 1: It was like a fourteen and under game. And you know,
Speaker 1: I was younger at the time. I was probably twelve
Speaker 1: at this time. Kobe's fourteen. And you know we played
Speaker 1: together in the game, and you know, I'm the point guard,
Speaker 1: Kobe's the big in But it was like he still
Speaker 1: did everything right, Like you know, we were going to him,
Speaker 1: Like he was scoring inside, he was stepping outside, making threes,
Speaker 1: he was going coast to coast, you know, dropping dimes.
Speaker 1: So he was different even at that age. He was
Speaker 1: not like everybody else. UM. And I remember that just
Speaker 1: you know, distinctly at that size. You know, I don't
Speaker 1: remember exactly how tall he was. He mad have be
Speaker 1: like six three six four, but he was taller than
Speaker 1: your average fourteen year old. And and he was more
Speaker 1: skilled and more fundamentally sound than than the average player
Speaker 1: at that age as well, Like Kobe was very polished
Speaker 1: and mature and refined in his game at that time, UM,
Speaker 1: especially playing amongst his age group, Like you could tell
Speaker 1: that he was used to playing with older players because
Speaker 1: he played the game with just a sense of maturity
Speaker 1: that everybody else wasn't playing with. From my perspective, the
Speaker 1: same person that I played with in the fourteen and
Speaker 1: under New York Philadelphia game back in three is the
Speaker 1: same person that I saw get eighty one points on
Speaker 1: the Toronto Raptors. The same dude, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Pabb Bryant twenty eight for forty six from the field.
Speaker 1: This would be eighteen for twenty from a line and
Speaker 1: at eighty one point game fifty five of the second half.
Speaker 1: You gotta get him out of game. Somebody got all
Speaker 1: there is a goo babbly hill back Bay said, let
Speaker 1: me listen for this number eight. Right. He was always
Speaker 1: that guy. He was a killer. Um, he was an assassin.
Speaker 1: He rose to the occasion, the bigger competition, the bigger performance.
Speaker 1: So that was part one. That was Ashley Howard, who
Speaker 1: looked up to Kobe as a role model and a
Speaker 1: kind of idol, giving us a look at Kobe as
Speaker 1: a kid, as an up and comer, as a young
Speaker 1: man hungry for big competition and big stages. Hey, this
Speaker 1: is Mike Sealsky, host and writer of I Am Kobe.
Speaker 1: This podcast project came out of my work on a
Speaker 1: related book called The Rise Kobe Bryant and the Pursuit
Speaker 1: of Immortality. If you want to explore other parts of
Speaker 1: Kobe's story, check out The Rise. It's not just a
Speaker 1: book version of the podcast. I dive deeper into some
Speaker 1: of the topics covered in this series, and even some
Speaker 1: that we don't cover at all. Kobe's upbringing, his family,
Speaker 1: his identity, his effect on his friends and teammates, his
Speaker 1: journey into the n b A and his earliest days
Speaker 1: with the Lakers. The Rise Kobe Bryant and the Pursuit
Speaker 1: of Immortality is out now. Just head over to the
Speaker 1: Rise of Kobe book dot com and you can buy
Speaker 1: it from any of your favorite retailers. That's the Rise
Speaker 1: of Kobe Book dot com. Thanks Here. In Part two,
Speaker 1: we're going to get into Kobe the pro basketball player,
Speaker 1: Kobe the immortal, and for that, Kobe, the competition was
Speaker 1: never bigger than it was in the seven NBA finals
Speaker 1: he reached during his twenty year career with the Lakers.
Speaker 1: People overlook that fact about him seven NBA finals. Michael
Speaker 1: ord And only made six. Granted Jordan and the Bulls
Speaker 1: won every time, and Kobe lost twice, but still seven
Speaker 1: finals anyway. The second of those finals. Appearances came in
Speaker 1: two thousand one against Kobe's hometown team, the Philadelphia seventies Sixers,
Speaker 1: and one of the Sixers who drew the assignment of
Speaker 1: having to guard Kobe during that series was Aaron McKee.
Speaker 1: Here share fly up with It's a great offensive rebounding
Speaker 1: on Aaron mcketh trying to go up with him Kobe
Speaker 1: with the fresher legs. McKee played thirteen years in the NBA,
Speaker 1: and that season was his best. He was named the
Speaker 1: league's sixth Man of the Year. He averaged more than
Speaker 1: eleven points a game, shot forty seven percent from the field,
Speaker 1: and established himself as one of the better defensive guards around.
Speaker 1: He and Kobe had some obvious similarities and some pretty
Speaker 1: big differences. Both of them had Philly roots. McKee had
Speaker 1: played for Simon Gratz High, one of the city's top programs,
Speaker 1: and for John Cheney at Temple. Both of them were
Speaker 1: roughly the same size. McKee was six five, Kobe was
Speaker 1: six six. Both were tough as dry rawhide, and McKee
Speaker 1: had played against Kobe in those memorable pickup games at
Speaker 1: the St. Joseph's University field House during the summer when
Speaker 1: I was in college, he would come up and he
Speaker 1: was always at a high i Q. He always had
Speaker 1: the skill set. He was more athletes then still polishing
Speaker 1: his game up early on. Can do just about anything
Speaker 1: and everything out on the court. You you clearly saw
Speaker 1: that can defend, rebound, shoot, can go get a shot,
Speaker 1: you know, block shots, the whole nine. He was just
Speaker 1: electric and he was full of energy. Six five long.
Speaker 1: He was doing all of those things. But what he
Speaker 1: was missing at that time is just being polished up
Speaker 1: and and and really truly understanding the game and not
Speaker 1: having the strength. He was wiry, strong, but he didn't
Speaker 1: have that man strength at that particular time. And then
Speaker 1: once he got to the NBA, he got polished up,
Speaker 1: He studied the game, he understood the game. He started
Speaker 1: get hitting the weighting room and getting stronger, you know,
Speaker 1: where he could take on the physicality of the NBA season.
Speaker 1: And then you started to see the total package here
Speaker 1: it is. You're talking about a premier offensive player who
Speaker 1: could have easily been the m v P every year,
Speaker 1: but he was also one of the premier defensive players.
Speaker 1: So he prided himself on being a two way player.
Speaker 1: Even when Kobe was moving from high school into the NBA.
Speaker 1: The idea that his background as a suburban kid who
Speaker 1: might be intimidated by older, more experienced players never held
Speaker 1: any water with McKey. He knew better. He'd been too
Speaker 1: close to Kobe's flame to think such a thing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that that was always a misconception, and it is basketball
Speaker 1: is basketball, and really that's the ship that he's always
Speaker 1: had on his shoulder. It was really the only thing
Speaker 1: that people could say that kind of I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: say it was a knock, but say, hey, let's let's
Speaker 1: play this against him. Oh, he's not from the in
Speaker 1: the city like most of the premier players were, you
Speaker 1: know back then. He's from the suburbs or he grew
Speaker 1: up in Italy. And he's different than us. He's not tougher.
Speaker 1: And he was one of the toughest guys that I knew.
Speaker 1: Mentally tough, because basketball is mentally tough. It's not physically tough.
Speaker 1: He was physically tough. He was mentally tough. You couldn't
Speaker 1: really talk to him because he was focused on what
Speaker 1: he you know, what he was doing, and and so
Speaker 1: you couldn't really rattle his cage with with words or
Speaker 1: anything else. You try to do push him or hit
Speaker 1: him or fil him hard, and that only made him stronger.
Speaker 1: And a stronger Kobe was a problem for the Sixers.
Speaker 1: He and McKy were roughly the same size, but Kobe
Speaker 1: was more athletic, was a better shooter, had a wider
Speaker 1: ray of offensive skills and moves. So entering the series,
Speaker 1: the plan for the Sixers just wasn't to have McKee
Speaker 1: try to guard Kobe one on one. The plan was
Speaker 1: to use every available small forward and big guard. The
Speaker 1: team has to throw everything and everyone they could at Kobe.
Speaker 1: So I always just tried to touch him and and
Speaker 1: and makeing shots difficult. I wasn't gonna play undisciplined and
Speaker 1: try to run for steels and open it up for
Speaker 1: him and give them the easy shots. I just wanted
Speaker 1: to try to make it as tough as possible for him,
Speaker 1: guard them, keep him in front of him, and putting
Speaker 1: them on the free throw line. Because all great scorers
Speaker 1: understand how to not only score the ball, but they
Speaker 1: understand when they when they're not making shots, they try
Speaker 1: to find ways to get layups. They try to find
Speaker 1: ways to get to the free throw line, and that
Speaker 1: helps those guys get going, we try to rotate guys
Speaker 1: on them. If it was myself, if it was Eric Snow,
Speaker 1: if it was you know whoever, Jamaine Jones, Roger Bell,
Speaker 1: we just wanted the ruttin uh fresh bodies on them. Again,
Speaker 1: those guys, those sort of players, see that night in
Speaker 1: and night out. Who are you getting all these defensive
Speaker 1: coverages and double teams and those sort of things. So
Speaker 1: you know they're prepared for that. And so he's, you know,
Speaker 1: one at the all time great For reason, the Sixers
Speaker 1: shocked the Lakers and the basketball world by winning Game
Speaker 1: one of the Finals in overtime. You might remember that game.
Speaker 1: It featured the unforgettable site of Alan Iverson swishing a
Speaker 1: baseline jump shot over Lakers guard Tyron Loop, then stepping
Speaker 1: over Loop who had fallen to the floor. One A
Speaker 1: three left and overdive one on one night a dive.
Speaker 1: Here's iver a little bit offender stays what Helen wants
Speaker 1: to go? Wants the baseline sait away. Yeah to god,
Speaker 1: they stuffed the round Loop. The Sixers up in a
Speaker 1: room something straight courts either to look at he was.
Speaker 1: Kobe would have liked to forget that entire game. It
Speaker 1: was his worst of that entire postseason. He took twenty
Speaker 1: two shots, missed fifteen of them, and scored just fifteen points.
Speaker 1: McKee didn't expect them to repeat such a subpar performance
Speaker 1: in Game two. You know, when you're talking about one
Speaker 1: at the top three players in the league playing out
Speaker 1: in l A and you know, especially after US win
Speaker 1: that first game, I knew he was gonna come back
Speaker 1: with different mindset. And it was his mindset was always
Speaker 1: killed or be killed. And I knew he was gonna
Speaker 1: come out firing away. And again my my I thought
Speaker 1: process was, Ay, we just gotta make it difficult for them.
Speaker 1: We're gonna come out firing and and and and trying
Speaker 1: to carry the load, and you know, just trying to
Speaker 1: find different ways to distract him. And you couldn't do
Speaker 1: those things. And so you know, once he got into
Speaker 1: his rhythm, it was, you know, he became really difficult
Speaker 1: to guard. By fire the riot to set up a
Speaker 1: short dropper six points point. So those first quarter for
Speaker 1: Coby Rods settled up setting there the shot of Coby
Speaker 1: well Let's staple. Kobe was back in his rhythm for
Speaker 1: most of the rest of the series. He scored thirty
Speaker 1: one points in Game two and thirty two points in
Speaker 1: Game three, and the Lakers didn't lose again, rolling to
Speaker 1: a five game victory and the championship. After the last
Speaker 1: game of the finals, a photographer snapped the shot of
Speaker 1: Kobe sitting alone, hugging the Larry O'Brien Trophy, a melancholy
Speaker 1: look on his face. He and his parents were not
Speaker 1: on speaking terms at the time. They're falling out over
Speaker 1: the direct and of his life was recent and fresh.
Speaker 1: It was one of the most bittersweet moments of his career,
Speaker 1: and it happened in his hometown, But it was not
Speaker 1: his first memorable moment in Philadelphia against the Sixers, and
Speaker 1: it was his last. In the first part of this episode,
Speaker 1: you heard Ashley Howard describe what Kobe was like when
Speaker 1: his basketball career was just starting. In the second part,
Speaker 1: Aaron McKee talked about what it was like to compete
Speaker 1: against Kobe in his prime, Kobe on basketball's biggest stage,
Speaker 1: Kobe winning a championship in the city of brotherly loved.
Speaker 1: In the third and final part, now, I thought it
Speaker 1: would be appropriate to focus on Kobe's debut in his
Speaker 1: hometown and his farewell in his hometown. On November, Kobe
Speaker 1: played in Philadelphia for the first time as a member
Speaker 1: of the Lakers. His family, his friends from Lower Marian,
Speaker 1: people who knew him from the Philly basketball scene, all
Speaker 1: of them were there to see him play. Then he
Speaker 1: went out there against a terrible Sixers team and took
Speaker 1: all of three shots in the first half. He missed
Speaker 1: them all. He didn't score a single point in the
Speaker 1: game's first twenty four minutes. If you thought Kobe, even
Speaker 1: as an eighteen year old rookie, would be deterred by
Speaker 1: that poor performance, you haven't been paying attention over the
Speaker 1: previous ten episodes of this series. He took more than
Speaker 1: twice as many shots in the second half seven this time,
Speaker 1: he made four of them. He finished with twelve points,
Speaker 1: the Lakers precise margin of victory that night. Four months
Speaker 1: after that game, in March, Kobe described the entire scene
Speaker 1: to Jeremy treat Well, there's half. I went out there
Speaker 1: within the most, within the most another offense. That's when
Speaker 1: I did on the ball a couple of times for
Speaker 1: the game. Uh, But when I went to to the
Speaker 1: locker hall, and I don't think I scored a point
Speaker 1: in the first half I knew any time I could
Speaker 1: go out there and do my I just had that
Speaker 1: confidence about me during the game. So I came up
Speaker 1: to the second half and then we struggle a little bit.
Speaker 1: We need somebody step up and put some points on
Speaker 1: the bull said, well, go ahead and go from my
Speaker 1: I do my thing and put some pointy from the bulls.
Speaker 1: So that's what I did in the second half. I'm
Speaker 1: crazy like high school, just highchool all over again. The
Speaker 1: whole fat being there at Man, people doing their them
Speaker 1: media dollars, same same play are. The difference is at
Speaker 1: at at at provlic Google MH. I want to thank
Speaker 1: a basic Uh felt there Man so good because I
Speaker 1: knew a lot of people were feeling who requested about
Speaker 1: the senor and saying that I couldn't make it or whatever.
Speaker 1: But I guess what kind of please. I was in
Speaker 1: there there handed myself and handed myself in that game.
Speaker 1: So I was happy say us for nearly twenty years.
Speaker 1: On December one, two thousand fifteen, Kobe played in Philadelphia
Speaker 1: for the final time when the Sixers toasted the Lakers.
Speaker 1: But the game was interesting for reasons beyond the fact
Speaker 1: that it would be Kobe's last one in his hometown.
Speaker 1: For one thing, the Sixers had played eighteen games that
Speaker 1: season before facing Kobe and the Lakers, and they had
Speaker 1: lost all eighteen. They were in the midst of the
Speaker 1: process their controversial plan to tank for a few years,
Speaker 1: get some high draft picks and presumably some great players,
Speaker 1: and try to rebuild for another Their head coach, Brett Brown,
Speaker 1: had spent as much time as anyone in the NBA
Speaker 1: studying Kobe or preparing to stop Kobe, or at least
Speaker 1: slow him down, or at least try. Brown knew that
Speaker 1: Kobe would want to put on a show in Philly,
Speaker 1: that he would be shooting the ball every chance he got.
Speaker 1: When Brown was working under Gregg Popovitch with the Antonio Spurs,
Speaker 1: he and the other coaches would ask themselves the same
Speaker 1: question every time they had to face Kobe, and they
Speaker 1: answer it the same way every time. Here's Brown, you
Speaker 1: know what sort of you prepared to die on? It
Speaker 1: was always the three point shot, you know, So if
Speaker 1: you was gonna be you with threes, you know, there
Speaker 1: wasn't much you could do about that. If you you
Speaker 1: did what you just said. What what fluor spots did
Speaker 1: you worry most about? He was incredibly efficient, proficient, pickle
Speaker 1: word whatever words you want at elbows in in wings
Speaker 1: like that. We called it the calm Alone line. That
Speaker 1: was pops fur bitch. And if you just took sort
Speaker 1: of a line from the elbow of a found line
Speaker 1: to the corner that die, you know that flaw spot
Speaker 1: he was incredible at. You remember Karl Malone, right, he
Speaker 1: was the Hall of Fame power forward for the utah As.
Speaker 1: One of his bread and butter moves was a little
Speaker 1: half fadeaway half jumper that he loved to shoot from
Speaker 1: a few feet inside three point part. He'd usually be
Speaker 1: open to take that shot off a pick and pop
Speaker 1: with point guard John Stock. That's what Brown means when
Speaker 1: he talks about the Karl Malone line draw trapezoid on
Speaker 1: a basketball court from the corners of the court to
Speaker 1: the upper corners of the lane. And Malone lived on
Speaker 1: the lines of that trapezoid. So did Kobe. And when
Speaker 1: he came to getting a shot off, he might have
Speaker 1: had the best footwork of any wing player in basketball history.
Speaker 1: And you know he without getting too technical on the
Speaker 1: specifics of his footwork, he could he whether it was
Speaker 1: a forward pivot, whether it was an inside pivot whether
Speaker 1: he really wanted his dominant pivot foot, which was his
Speaker 1: left foot in his right foot was free where he
Speaker 1: could play a little bit of a rocker step type game.
Speaker 1: You know, those two elbows, those two Malone lines on
Speaker 1: the right side and the left side. He just was
Speaker 1: incredibly efficient and dangerous, especially from those spots. Kobe's footwork
Speaker 1: was impeccable. He was prideful at drilling it. He was
Speaker 1: adamant on on dictating like this is how I'm gonna
Speaker 1: play in and a lot of times, Mike, when you
Speaker 1: as I said, to start six seconds left, you can
Speaker 1: book it like he's gonna be on one of the
Speaker 1: elbows or one of those Malone lines that I spoke of,
Speaker 1: and you know he's gonna stick his dominant pivot foot
Speaker 1: and then at that point you've got your hands full.
Speaker 1: So Brown and the Sixers picked their poison. They would
Speaker 1: let Kobe shoot threes, and well this happened. He's also
Speaker 1: one of their best three one guys. Probably loses off
Speaker 1: time starting to a game between the two words records
Speaker 1: on the move, he didn't go they three. The Sixers
Speaker 1: weren't just a bad team that season. They were a young,
Speaker 1: inexperienced team, star struck by Kobe and the charged atmosphere
Speaker 1: inside the Wells Spargo Center. One of their best bench players,
Speaker 1: for example, was t J McConnell. McConnell has since established
Speaker 1: himself as one of the best backup point guards in
Speaker 1: the NBA, but at the time, he was just a
Speaker 1: rookie and he and his teammates weren't carrying out the
Speaker 1: defensive strategy that Brown wanted them to play. If we
Speaker 1: wanted to blitz Kobe, to go double team moment, and
Speaker 1: I remember calling a time out. Now it's going to
Speaker 1: teach a you know, are you gonna blitz him or
Speaker 1: you're gonna kiss him? T J was. T J was starstruck.
Speaker 1: He Mike, he was starstruck. Like all my guys you
Speaker 1: don't want his autograph more than they want to defend
Speaker 1: him well, and he came out and hit like four
Speaker 1: out of his first five shots. He came out and
Speaker 1: I think with ten minutes and like forty seconds he
Speaker 1: was three ft four from threes. It's true and uh
Speaker 1: and they were all threes, which is what I said.
Speaker 1: You know, ten minutes ago, if you had what sod
Speaker 1: you gonna die and it's gonna be the three and
Speaker 1: h It's true. He came into Philadelphia and just lit
Speaker 1: up the building. At the start, the building was electric.
Speaker 1: Bryant another thraity, drained it. Kobe Bryant is fourth three
Speaker 1: of the game, his first points of the quarter, but
Speaker 1: he's high man in the game. With sixteen. Kobe couldn't
Speaker 1: keep up his hot shooting. He finished seven of twenty
Speaker 1: six from the field and scored twenty points, and the
Speaker 1: Lakers actually lost. It was the six Ers first victory
Speaker 1: of the season. I was in the building that night
Speaker 1: to write a column about Kobe for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Speaker 1: The Philly fans had shown Kobe their love and appreciation
Speaker 1: for him in a way they never had before, but
Speaker 1: it was clear he wasn't really the same player anymore.
Speaker 1: He was thirty seven. He moved a little slower, jumped
Speaker 1: a little lower. His footwork and fundamentals weren't enough to
Speaker 1: overcome the limitations that age had imposed on him. Plus,
Speaker 1: the sport was changing, centering itself around offensive efficiency and
Speaker 1: the three point shot. The Golden State Warriors, with Steph
Speaker 1: Curry and Clay Thompson, the best shooting backcourt the NBA
Speaker 1: has ever seen, had won the championship a few months earlier,
Speaker 1: and they were in the midst of a season in
Speaker 1: which they'd win a league record seventy three games and
Speaker 1: reached the finals. Again, the idea that a team should
Speaker 1: build itself around a player like Kobe, a player who
Speaker 1: took long two point jumpers, a player who could score
Speaker 1: from anywhere on the floor and would shoot from even
Speaker 1: the places where the stats said he shouldn't, was totally
Speaker 1: passet if you can kind of put Kobe in context
Speaker 1: in that regard, like Wold, with modern coaches allowed him
Speaker 1: to play the way that he played. As silly as
Speaker 1: that sounds, no, I mean, it's it's a good question.
Speaker 1: And I I've seen a lot over two decades with
Speaker 1: trends and things in the NBA. You know, the NBA
Speaker 1: has changed in so so so many ways over that
Speaker 1: twenty year period that I'm that I'm speaking of, and
Speaker 1: you know, with the exception of what two years I
Speaker 1: was in the NBA, every one of Kobe's years and
Speaker 1: you know, you look at it in the analytics topic
Speaker 1: that we're speaking of. Um, it's one of the most
Speaker 1: profound things that have crept into our league. And I
Speaker 1: think at times, if you're not careful, it really it
Speaker 1: crushes I think a spirit of a player. It can
Speaker 1: influence coaches. Uh if if you're not careful, and it
Speaker 1: did me, you know in in in ways that you
Speaker 1: look back and it's it's just negative. It doesn't let's
Speaker 1: score a score. Now. I think that that blanket um
Speaker 1: comment that I have just made. He can creep into
Speaker 1: other people, role players. You know, you don't want role
Speaker 1: players taken long too. Is that are contested, like we
Speaker 1: all get that. But you know Kobe Bryant's ability to
Speaker 1: just get buckets and school points and kind of do
Speaker 1: it when he put his mind to it, he was
Speaker 1: just off the charts. And after that game, Brown was
Speaker 1: in his office at the arena, still decompressing, when he
Speaker 1: heard a knock on his door. It was Alan Lumpkin,
Speaker 1: who has been the Sixers travel director and team liaison
Speaker 1: for years. He said, coaching, you have a guest wants
Speaker 1: to say hello, and and Kobe knocked on the door
Speaker 1: and came in and I, as I said, you know,
Speaker 1: I've known him because of the London Olympic Games, coaching
Speaker 1: against him. Uh, overseas a few all Star Games and
Speaker 1: this and that. So there was a you know, a
Speaker 1: brief history that I had hit with him. And he
Speaker 1: came in and he knew my son was going to
Speaker 1: Long Mari in high school and and obviously he he
Speaker 1: had wished the six as well, and knew well trying
Speaker 1: to you know, get the program back on track. But
Speaker 1: I sat with him for forty five minutes and they
Speaker 1: had to knock on my door and you know, get
Speaker 1: him out and tell him any of the bus was leaving,
Speaker 1: they're going back to the hotel. But and so the
Speaker 1: conversation was all about now what for him? And he
Speaker 1: just blew me away with his vision of what he
Speaker 1: wanted his life to be after basketball. He just he
Speaker 1: was just in the game. He was engaged. It was
Speaker 1: just a glow and energy about what was going to
Speaker 1: be for Kobe. And uh, it was a heck of
Speaker 1: a night. It was a great night. Brett Brown was right,
Speaker 1: It was a heck of a night. I was there,
Speaker 1: and the love that Sixers fans and that Philadelphia in
Speaker 1: general showed to Kobe was something to see. He'd always
Speaker 1: had a love hate relationship with the city, with a
Speaker 1: lot more emphasis on the hate, but I'd argue that's
Speaker 1: only because they were so alike and had so much
Speaker 1: in common. Kobe wanted to win more than anything. Philly
Speaker 1: fans want to win more than anything. Yeah. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: wasn't really from the city. He was from the Bourbs.
Speaker 1: He was a Laker blah blah blah. As you can
Speaker 1: see from this episode, from his early life to the
Speaker 1: prime of his career to the end of his two
Speaker 1: decades with the Lakers, Kobe was as tough, as driven,
Speaker 1: as determined to achieve greatness as anyone who ever played
Speaker 1: in the NBA. That's exactly the sort of athlete that
Speaker 1: a city like Philadelphia or Los Angeles or New York
Speaker 1: or any city in the world would have appreciated and adored. No,
Speaker 1: Kobe technically wasn't from philip but if he had played
Speaker 1: in Philly, it would have been time NBA Champions of
Speaker 1: Six six card from Harvar in high school where he
Speaker 1: won the title, and not Cofee Well, it would have
Speaker 1: been just about perfect. I Am Kobe is a production
Speaker 1: of the Version podcasts in association with I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: This season is written and hosted by me Mike Sealsky.
Speaker 1: It's produced by Jacob Bronstein and directed by Mark Francis.
Speaker 1: Story editing by Jacob Bronstein, with editorial direction from Scott Waxman, Editing,
Speaker 1: mixing and sound design by Mark Francis. Stephen Thompkins is
Speaker 1: our production assistant. Our theme music is Create Yourself by
Speaker 1: Grover Brown featuring Justin Starling. Find Create Yourself wherever you
Speaker 1: stream music. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Freesans Sinking,
Speaker 1: Executive producers are Mark Francis and Scott Waxman. Join the
Speaker 1: conversation about I Am Kobe on social media on Twitter
Speaker 1: and Instagram. It's at diversion Pods thanks to Orin Rosenbaum,
Speaker 1: Susan Cannavan and Jeremy Treatment the Iris before the Son.
Speaker 1: They don't want to stand. When I said to Brian,
Speaker 1: is fun. Never clack you out, even when my work
Speaker 1: is done. If they're trying to black me, I might heart.
Speaker 1: Someone throw the blood sweat and says, we part sever
Speaker 1: stay tending in, let it keep us in. If they
Speaker 1: don't believe in themselves, table vert to fit that the
Speaker 1: champion's head. So I'm telling them, ask my am, this
Speaker 1: the reason why my work so damn different to the negatives.
Speaker 1: I can't listen see me at the tip, you can't
Speaker 1: listen for where I'm gonna vote to play like cash
Speaker 1: is see I pay my dudes because of taxes. Gotta work,
Speaker 1: I think and grind ahead of his time. So I'm
Speaker 1: saying that they made you. Don't tell them you create
Speaker 1: yourself the best you finn or watch us by this
Speaker 1: by that time you gotta steak clock, then break clock,
Speaker 1: break we create yourself. Watch me question, watch me to
Speaker 1: create myself. Exac client times up and create yourself. Say nice,
Speaker 1: ain't go hard create yourself. You gotta learn from the
Speaker 1: great minds. But we ain't lying. Tell them that this anytime,
Speaker 1: This time wasn't given, it was made the future any
Speaker 1: time I can change better, tell them that I made
Speaker 1: it back home. As I walked through the hearts of
Speaker 1: the fame, I came from the valley of the Shadow,
Speaker 1: with death waiting for us. Some spoons don't hold your breath,
Speaker 1: sat Town, sat trains. But I did it with less.
Speaker 1: I know one that the being. So there's nothing to guess. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's nothing to guess. It's our times. Something we up next.
Speaker 1: We don't got any regrests. I did it with my
Speaker 1: soul hands and we never forgets my air. This the
Speaker 1: reason why my work so damn different to the negatives.
Speaker 1: I can't listen to see me at the time, you
Speaker 1: can't listen for where, rebuild, rechape, give me your eye.
Speaker 1: You got to risk take do it now. When I'm
Speaker 1: saying why waits, I was saying that they may you
Speaker 1: will tell them you create yourself the best you Finn
Speaker 1: watch us by. It's bad that time. You gotta sneak clock,
Speaker 1: then break clock. Break we create ourselves. Watch me, watch
Speaker 1: me create myself. Exac climb signs up. Create yourself. Say
Speaker 1: nice and ain't so hard? Create yourself. You gotta lie
Speaker 1: for the great minds, but we ain't lying. Tell them
Speaker 1: that's any time, ye. Diversion Podcasts