Speaker 1: Diversion podcasts. I really thought to myself about the future,
Speaker 1: and you know, I always came up with the same
Speaker 1: conclusion that I always wanted to be famous. When I
Speaker 1: was a little I always wanted to be a great
Speaker 1: basketball player. When you work hard, when you achieve something,
Speaker 1: you set a goal. My goal is to be a
Speaker 1: great basketball player. To be famous. Then you can expect that.
Speaker 1: You know, you can't be on TV all the time
Speaker 1: and not expect people you know who you are and
Speaker 1: coming to you actually for autograph. So I accepted. I accepted,
Speaker 1: and I saw pluss if I was a little kid
Speaker 1: and I looked up at somebody and I wanted an autograph.
Speaker 1: I want to basket with an autograph, and they said no,
Speaker 1: I'd be crushed. So when somebody comes into me I
Speaker 1: asked for autograph, I'm not going I say short. In
Speaker 1: the summer of the head coach and general manager of
Speaker 1: the Philadelphia seventy sixers was a man named John Lucas.
Speaker 1: Lucas had spent a star crossed fourteen years in the
Speaker 1: NBA as a quick, left handed and troubled point guard.
Speaker 1: A drug and alcohol addiction had nearly ruined his career,
Speaker 1: but he had turned his life around, and as a
Speaker 1: coach he had a bit of a Pollyanna view of players.
Speaker 1: He always saw the very very best in that always
Speaker 1: believed they would reach their highest potential. He was a dreamer.
Speaker 1: He just wasn't a particularly good NBA coach. During the season,
Speaker 1: the Sixers won twenty four games under Lucas and lost
Speaker 1: fifty eight. Here, they blew a twenty one lead in
Speaker 1: a gut wrenching loss to chart Was Barkley and the
Speaker 1: Phoenix Suns in front of their home crowd in Philly.
Speaker 1: Final score the Sun setting a franchise record with their
Speaker 1: ninth straight victory, and they do it in a most
Speaker 1: improbable way. At John Lucas will ruminate about this one
Speaker 1: Phoenix one oh eight s seven. One night in March,
Speaker 1: John Lucas attended a Lower Merion High School playoff game
Speaker 1: with his family at the Polesto. It wasn't that surprising
Speaker 1: for Lucas to attend the game, after all, his daughter
Speaker 1: Tarvia was a junior at Lower Marian. But just as
Speaker 1: Lucas stepped into the arena, something did surprise him. He
Speaker 1: ran into a guy who he had played against dozens
Speaker 1: of times in the NBA, he ran into Joe Bryant.
Speaker 1: John Lucas had heard of Kobe Bryant, but he didn't
Speaker 1: know that Kobe was Joe's son. So after Lucas watched
Speaker 1: Lower Marian win, after he watched Kobe scored twenty six
Speaker 1: points in just twenty seven minutes of action, he got
Speaker 1: an idea. Back then, it was common for pro and
Speaker 1: college players to work out, scrimmage and play pickup games
Speaker 1: together during the NBA off season, kind of like an
Speaker 1: unofficial summer league. Lucas was so impressed with Kobe that
Speaker 1: he thought the Sixers might be able to draft him
Speaker 1: the following year. So he called up the Bryant's and
Speaker 1: asked if Kobe wanted to work out with the team
Speaker 1: that summer full court games at the field house at St.
Speaker 1: Joseph's University and at nearby Episcopal Academy. Several of the
Speaker 1: Sixers players would be there, including power forward Sharon Right
Speaker 1: and the team's seven ft six inch center Shawn Bradley.
Speaker 1: Kobe of course said yes. Then Lucas called his old
Speaker 1: backcourt mate and buddy from the University of Maryland, Mo Howard,
Speaker 1: Joe's old friend from high school Lucas gave Howard an assignment.
Speaker 1: It was his job to oversee these scrimmages and to
Speaker 1: make sure that Kobe played in as many of them
Speaker 1: as he wanted. Mo Howard still lives in Philadelphia and
Speaker 1: he's still a big name in basketball around the city.
Speaker 1: He gets asked about that summer of ninety five a lot,
Speaker 1: but he never minds talking about it. He was there
Speaker 1: each day to see the turning point in Kobe Bryant's
Speaker 1: basketball career and in his life. Finally, describe what you
Speaker 1: saw from Kobe during that summer when John Lucas had
Speaker 1: you running those scrimmages at St. Joe's in Episcopal Wow. Wow,
Speaker 1: I'm Mike seal Scope and from Diversion Podcasts, this is
Speaker 1: I am Kobe st w state to create myself. Create yourself,
Speaker 1: very nice. Create yourself got a pretty great minds. But
Speaker 1: we ain't time. Episode six. The summer of Mo Howard
Speaker 1: had played with and against Kobe in Sunday morning pickup
Speaker 1: games at a y m c A in Center City, Philadelphia,
Speaker 1: back when Kobe was just thirteen years old. He knew
Speaker 1: how good the kid was, at least he thought he knew,
Speaker 1: and he were playing those games and like he won
Speaker 1: and held his own, but to play against the pros
Speaker 1: at the level that he did was really surprised. In
Speaker 1: two story, so we're sitting there, it's Maurice Chiefs, myself
Speaker 1: and Harold Cats. Just for the record, Maurice Cheeks was
Speaker 1: a Hall of Fame point guard who spent eleven of
Speaker 1: his fifteen NBA seasons with the Sixers. In the summer,
Speaker 1: he was one of their assistant coaches, and Harold Katz
Speaker 1: was the team's owner and a total basketball junkie. He
Speaker 1: would stay up late to watch NBA games then quiz
Speaker 1: his executives and coaches about players around the league. And
Speaker 1: Carol Kats is watching Guys scimmage and he says about Kobe,
Speaker 1: where is he from? And Maurice Cheeks says a Laura Marian.
Speaker 1: Harold Katt says to Maurice, well, I don't want to
Speaker 1: know where he lives, but where is he from? And
Speaker 1: Maurice says He's from Lower Merion High School and Harold
Speaker 1: Cats looks at him with his look of surprise, saying huh.
Speaker 1: And then Maurice goes on to tell him that he's
Speaker 1: Joe Bryant's son, so even you know, the guy who
Speaker 1: was the owner of the team was very, very surprised
Speaker 1: and how skilled Kobe was. At that time. Kobe wasn't
Speaker 1: the only Lower Marian player competing in those scrimmages. Emery Dabney,
Speaker 1: a talented point guard from West Philadelphia who had played
Speaker 1: summer ball with Kobe and the Aces, was transferring into
Speaker 1: Lower Marian for his sophomore year. John Lucas had seen
Speaker 1: him play and invited him to the workouts too. It
Speaker 1: was crazy. I remember the first couple of days, I
Speaker 1: was nervous. It was very surreal, to be honest, because
Speaker 1: as a fifth year on myself and you're playing with
Speaker 1: these guys at an NBA. It was surreal. But then
Speaker 1: after the first couple of workouts, you're like, okay, like
Speaker 1: I used to playing with these guys. And who were
Speaker 1: some of the guys in the gym. Richard Dumas, Vernon Maxwell,
Speaker 1: Jared Stockhouse, a guy who played in North Carolina named
Speaker 1: Donna Williams. Some pretty good players, uh, some older NBA.
Speaker 1: I remember Willie Burton, I don't never remember that name
Speaker 1: played for the six was back in the day. It
Speaker 1: was some really good players and Kobe right away. Didn't
Speaker 1: care who they were, he didn't care what they had
Speaker 1: done before. He was trying to test to see how
Speaker 1: good he was. So he was going right at all
Speaker 1: those guys. And that's how kind of the robbery between
Speaker 1: him and dark Stackhouse kind of started. Ah, Yes, Jerry Stackhouse.
Speaker 1: When you hear anyone talk about Kobe's workouts in the
Speaker 1: summer of you hear about Jerry Stackhouse. He had been
Speaker 1: a high school phenom himself just a few years earlier,
Speaker 1: and he'd become a human highlighted names during his time
Speaker 1: at North Carolina. He's He's Jaman, Slimming Crab, Jap, slip Little.
Speaker 1: The Sixers had taken Stackhouse with a third overall pick
Speaker 1: in NBA Draft. At North Carolina, he'd been Sports Illustrated
Speaker 1: National Player of the Year and had taken the tar
Speaker 1: Heels to the Final Four. He was supposed to be
Speaker 1: the Sixer savior. Stackhouse was playing in those summer scrimmages
Speaker 1: and pickup games too, and you would have thought he
Speaker 1: would dominate them and Kobe, except their battles on the
Speaker 1: court back then have taken on the aura of myth
Speaker 1: and legend ever since. In a way that has always
Speaker 1: put Stackhouse in Kobe shadow. I saw this. I watched
Speaker 1: those scrimmages. I watched those workouts, and you know, there
Speaker 1: were some days that Jerry would get the best of Kobe,
Speaker 1: and there were some days that Kobe would get the
Speaker 1: best of Jerry. But Kobe did it in a more
Speaker 1: spectacular fashion, right. So I witnessed one day we were
Speaker 1: scrimmaging out Episcopal Bowl and Kobe and Jerry were going
Speaker 1: head to head with each other as they did, and
Speaker 1: Maurice Cheeks and I was standing there watching, and if
Speaker 1: I'm mistaken, Jerry Stackhouse was the second pick that year.
Speaker 1: He was a third pick. So Maurice Cheeks looks at
Speaker 1: me and he says, if Jerry Stackhouse is number three,
Speaker 1: Kobe has to be three. A Kobe's friend, Jeremy Treatment,
Speaker 1: who was about to go from covering him to coaching him,
Speaker 1: went to two of those scrimmages. Listened to his voice
Speaker 1: as he tells me his impressions of Kobe from those games.
Speaker 1: And he wasn't backing down anybody. He had a boldness
Speaker 1: about him. The thing that was so called when Joe
Speaker 1: Bryant called me and said, I don't even need to go.
Speaker 1: Sean Bradley calls the house and says, I'll pick up.
Speaker 1: At seven. They were picking him up. They wounded him
Speaker 1: to come. He seemed a little young, but he also
Speaker 1: seemed like it belonged. It just was like he's sixteen
Speaker 1: and he's playing with twenty seven year old NBA players.
Speaker 1: It was It was kind of crazy. But I was
Speaker 1: not surprised that he held his own I was not
Speaker 1: surprised that he gave from Stackhouse all he could handle.
Speaker 1: Stackhouse did not take kindly to these comparisons to Code.
Speaker 1: He still doesn't. He's now the head men's basketball coach
Speaker 1: at Vanderbilt University, and when I reached out to him
Speaker 1: and Vanderbilt Sports information office to see if he would
Speaker 1: speak to me from my book about Kobe, he declined.
Speaker 1: And he kind of has a point. By the time
Speaker 1: the Sixers drafted him, he had already been compared to
Speaker 1: Michael Jordan's mostly because both of them had gone to
Speaker 1: North Carolina and were high flying acrobats when they had
Speaker 1: the basketball in their hands and a chance to dunk it.
Speaker 1: But Michael and Kobe were guards, straight up shooting guards.
Speaker 1: Stackhouse wasn't Stackhouse had played power forward in high school
Speaker 1: and at North Carolina. He had never played guard in
Speaker 1: his life until the Sixers drafted him. He wasn't used
Speaker 1: to chasing smaller, quicker players around screens or squaring up
Speaker 1: for twenty ft jump shots. He and Kobe had different
Speaker 1: sets of skills and were different players, and people thought
Speaker 1: the teenager was better. It was a total no win
Speaker 1: situation for Stackhouse. If he was better than Kobe, well
Speaker 1: he should be. Kobe was just a high school kid.
Speaker 1: And if Kobe out played him, what did that say
Speaker 1: about the guy who was supposed to be the Sixers
Speaker 1: franchise player. His frustration was growing with every scrimmage. Here's
Speaker 1: Emery Dabney. Then at one point they Stackhouse started found
Speaker 1: him hard and they almost got into it. They you know,
Speaker 1: Stackhouse grabbed them and we had to kind of break them.
Speaker 1: Those two up. He was relentless because, like I said,
Speaker 1: for a guy in high school who's not even is
Speaker 1: going at the number one overall pick, like going at
Speaker 1: him relentlessly. It was kind of crazy. And but honestly,
Speaker 1: Brendon Maxwell, I don't know if you remember les called
Speaker 1: Mad Max. He he's the one that really instigated it
Speaker 1: because I remembers meet him and Kovid in the same team.
Speaker 1: I forget who the other two players were. But every
Speaker 1: time he gave Covid a ball and Stackhouse was gardener,
Speaker 1: he would just go kill him, kill him, like for
Speaker 1: the whole, the whole possession. And it was like no
Speaker 1: one else would touch the ball, and Renna Maxwell come
Speaker 1: down and give him the ball, tell him to kill him.
Speaker 1: So after a while, you know, Stackhouse wasn't too happy
Speaker 1: about him. No, Stackhouse wasn't happy. But Kobe had to
Speaker 1: be elated. Here he was holding his own against NBA players,
Speaker 1: and he was just turning seventeen that August, and often
Speaker 1: he was more than holding his own. In fact, to
Speaker 1: put it bluntly, Kobe was showing that he already surpassed
Speaker 1: some of them when it came to the intangibles that
Speaker 1: were necessary to succeed in the league. When I was
Speaker 1: talking to Mo Howard about those games, he said something
Speaker 1: about Kobe that has stuck in my memory ever since.
Speaker 1: It captured perfectly the player Kobe was then and the
Speaker 1: player he would become. What I saw was unique work.
Speaker 1: Unlike any of the other pros and college players who
Speaker 1: participated in those open runs. H he was the first
Speaker 1: one there every day. He was the last one of
Speaker 1: these every day, every day without fail. I just couldn't
Speaker 1: believe that he was that highly skilled, like playing against
Speaker 1: pro guys. He was so highly skilled and motivated that,
Speaker 1: you know, I was a little surprised. Kobe's workouts didn't
Speaker 1: involve just best the ball either. He and Dabney would
Speaker 1: run on the track at St. Joseph's University too, before
Speaker 1: heading to the field House to play. A few days
Speaker 1: that summer, the field House was closed, so the NBA
Speaker 1: guys would be playing at the gym at Episcopal Academy,
Speaker 1: which was right across the strungle track. Minds just August
Speaker 1: and we would get in the car and when you
Speaker 1: drive over to a pisco, you know, I'm probably not
Speaker 1: even a two minute drive. It's outfter the workouts, you know.
Speaker 1: I get in the car Kobe and it's uh ninety
Speaker 1: degrees outside, and he pulls the windows up and he
Speaker 1: turns the heat on, and I'm like, Kobe, like, what
Speaker 1: are you doing? I might have a heart attack and
Speaker 1: I can't what are you doing? He's like, I'm about
Speaker 1: to go play in the stackhouse. I gotta stay warm.
Speaker 1: I don't want to cool down before before I play.
Speaker 1: I'm like, all right, what do you I can't do this.
Speaker 1: I have a heart attack. And he stops at the
Speaker 1: light and he goes, you can get out, Kobe. Let
Speaker 1: him crack the window a little. But I can't think
Speaker 1: of a better metaphor for who Kobe Bryant was then
Speaker 1: and where he thought, no, where he knew he was going.
Speaker 1: If you're with me, if you believe in me, if
Speaker 1: you're willing to sacrifice like I am, you can come
Speaker 1: along for the ride. If you're not, you can get out. Hey.
Speaker 1: This is Mike Selsky, 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. When Kobe wasn't running
Speaker 1: full court with Jerry Stackhouse and the rest of those
Speaker 1: guys and those uber intense pickup games, he was traveling
Speaker 1: around the United States on his Amateur Athletic Union teams
Speaker 1: better known as the a U Circuit. He was up
Speaker 1: and down the East coast of Las Vegas, all over,
Speaker 1: going to camps, playing in tournaments with other big time
Speaker 1: college recruits. Of course, given his plans and goals, it
Speaker 1: might not be right to call him a recruit. The
Speaker 1: highlight of that summer of ninety five was in early
Speaker 1: July in te Neck, New Jersey, at the prestigious A
Speaker 1: b c D Camp, which was sponsored by Adidas and
Speaker 1: sneaker mogul Sonny Vacar Picaro had founded A B c D.
Speaker 1: In The camp gathered the highest ranked high school players
Speaker 1: in the country in one place. It was considered the
Speaker 1: marquee event of the summer in high school hoops. Greg
Speaker 1: Downer and Mike Egan, Kobe's coaches at Lower Marian, went
Speaker 1: up there to see him play. Here's Egan. He was
Speaker 1: just phenomenal. There he was and were a lot of
Speaker 1: the kids. And this is where his maturity really came
Speaker 1: into play, where a lot of these guys were looking
Speaker 1: at it as fun and show voting and who you know,
Speaker 1: how many guys sent me? And he was there because
Speaker 1: at that point he was considered a top five player
Speaker 1: in the country. In Tim Thomas, Leicester are all Jeremain
Speaker 1: Neal and sometimes you hollow it was you a little
Speaker 1: higher than him. And Kobe went up there and never
Speaker 1: said of this. Does we know he even up there
Speaker 1: with a mission. He wants to come out of there
Speaker 1: being called the number one player in the country. And
Speaker 1: at the end of that week he was the consensus
Speaker 1: not a one player in country. Kobe had scored ten
Speaker 1: eighty out of a possible six on his s A
Speaker 1: T S. He was a very good student. He had
Speaker 1: grown particularly close to his tenth grade English teacher, Jeane Mastriano.
Speaker 1: In fact, she became an intellectual mentor to him. The
Speaker 1: two of them remained in touch throughout his life. Mastriano
Speaker 1: spent a lot of time in her class delving into
Speaker 1: the concept of the hero's journey. Her students watched Star
Speaker 1: Wars and class, for example, to understand the symbolism behind
Speaker 1: Luke Skywalker's path to becoming a Jedi, they read Joseph
Speaker 1: Campbell's famous book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Mastriano
Speaker 1: told me that Kobe loved it all. One of the
Speaker 1: things that he really soaked up was the hero's journey,
Speaker 1: which is something I talked about at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the year, throughout the year. At the end of the year,
Speaker 1: it kind of followed the arc of the whole year,
Speaker 1: the whole idea that you're going into an unknown here
Speaker 1: and you need to take risks. We all need to
Speaker 1: take risks, and if you don't take risks, then you're
Speaker 1: not going to happen experience. It's going to be exhilarating.
Speaker 1: We need to scare yourself. Do you think he saw
Speaker 1: himself on that kind of hero's journey. Absolutely. He believed
Speaker 1: in his number one dream, which was that he was
Speaker 1: going to realize his life as a basketball player, and
Speaker 1: that he was going to go in that direction. He
Speaker 1: was convinced he was going to do that. How could
Speaker 1: he be so sure though, especially at such an early
Speaker 1: stage of his life. Where did that confidence come from?
Speaker 1: I think there's a clue in something Mastriano told me.
Speaker 1: I asked her what Kobe was like in class, how
Speaker 1: he carried himself, how he acted and behaved. You know,
Speaker 1: the stereotype of the high school jock doesn't care much
Speaker 1: about his grades, doesn't need to worry about his homework
Speaker 1: because he's going to get a football scholarship or a
Speaker 1: basketball scholarship, or a swimming scholarship. That wasn't Kobe. He
Speaker 1: had this relentless curiosity, and he challenged Mastriano just like
Speaker 1: she would challenge him, in a good way, not in
Speaker 1: a bad way. He was confident that he could go
Speaker 1: back and forth with her that because of his life
Speaker 1: experiences and the path he was on, he already existed
Speaker 1: on her level intellectually and professionally, and she in turn
Speaker 1: appreciated that quality in him. He wasn't much of a talker,
Speaker 1: but the energy that he exhumed was palpable. Since I
Speaker 1: have when I looked back on him, somebody wouldn't hesitate
Speaker 1: to say, why are we learning this? Not in a
Speaker 1: terribly antagonistic way, but like, this is just not doing
Speaker 1: a thing for me. I don't see where this is going.
Speaker 1: Could it please justify? And I love that. I love
Speaker 1: the kid who's edgy, who's argumentative. It's just such wonderful
Speaker 1: than There was no question that Kobe could get into
Speaker 1: any college he wanted, but it was becoming obvious to
Speaker 1: everyone around him how his focus was narrowing to just
Speaker 1: one thing, basketball, you know. And then here's Mikey when
Speaker 1: he worked at things so much. His junior year, he
Speaker 1: was a student. He was still trying to get his
Speaker 1: grades up and his s A T s up and
Speaker 1: make sure there was no issues with college, which there
Speaker 1: would not have been anyway. But every day he got
Speaker 1: better and every day he we saw something from him
Speaker 1: that we'd be lying if we said we knew he
Speaker 1: could be would be an vy a superstar as a junior.
Speaker 1: But then between his junior and senior year, that's when
Speaker 1: his game really elevated. And when he came back as
Speaker 1: a senior, it was all basketball. And then we started
Speaker 1: looking at each other and say, this kid's gonna be really,
Speaker 1: really something. The expectations for Lower Marian's basketball team Kobe's
Speaker 1: senior year were just about as high as the expectations
Speaker 1: for its star player. Anything less than a district championship
Speaker 1: or state championship or both would be considered a disappointment.
Speaker 1: But in an early season test at Kobe's old stopping
Speaker 1: grounds from the summer, the St. Joe's field House, the
Speaker 1: Aces got stopped by Saint Anthony of Jersey City. St.
Speaker 1: Anthony was one of the two or three best high
Speaker 1: school teams in the country, maybe the best, and they
Speaker 1: were coached by the great Bob Hurley, a member of
Speaker 1: the Basketball Hall of Fame. This clip from CBS explains
Speaker 1: both Curly's accolades and his dedications to the program. With
Speaker 1: an unyielding determination and by relentlessly striving for perfection on
Speaker 1: the floor, Bob Hurley has built the basketball program at St.
Speaker 1: Anthony's High School into a perennial powerhouse, and we're getting
Speaker 1: ready for the state tournament. We can't go down and
Speaker 1: just run nothing. Flawa Marian was never really in the
Speaker 1: game against St. Anthony. They lost by fifteen points, and
Speaker 1: Kobe had twenty eight of those forty seven points. A
Speaker 1: quarter century later, Curly still remembers that game and Kobe's
Speaker 1: performance in it very well eight really, and he had
Speaker 1: no he had no help tony other players. We were
Speaker 1: able to cheat off them and uh, you know, help
Speaker 1: against him. And then after the game, he come over
Speaker 1: to me and asked if we could talk, and we
Speaker 1: sat down and sat down on the bleachers at St.
Speaker 1: Joe's and he talked about what things I think he
Speaker 1: needed to do to become up at a player. And
Speaker 1: I remember talking to him about how the first half
Speaker 1: had ended with we had stolen the ball from him
Speaker 1: and we scored to end half and I put us
Speaker 1: up one and he kind of put his chin down
Speaker 1: and kind of walked off the court. And the second
Speaker 1: half sought it, and the first four minutes of the
Speaker 1: second half he wasn't dominant like he could be. And
Speaker 1: I talked to him about his reaction to that mistake
Speaker 1: and how how important erasing that mistake would be with
Speaker 1: the way he would play early in the second half
Speaker 1: of the game. Totally understood, thank me so much for it.
Speaker 1: And then you know, we farther ways, but you know,
Speaker 1: he just was mature beyond his years. But we played
Speaker 1: against unbelievable players over the years, and he's the best
Speaker 1: player we ever played against. You know you're sek average
Speaker 1: over thirty game where people got thirty against St. Anthony, say,
Speaker 1: should have got a trophy. That's no minor compliment from
Speaker 1: a coach like Bob Hurley, And it was pretty revealing
Speaker 1: that Kobe would seize the opportunity to sit down with
Speaker 1: her to pick his brain. Kobe didn't see Hurly as
Speaker 1: an opposing coach. He saw him as a resource. It
Speaker 1: was like Kobe was saying to himself, losing the St.
Speaker 1: Anthony hurts, but I can get better in the long
Speaker 1: run because of it. An even bigger test for Kobe
Speaker 1: and Lower Marion came after the St. Anthony Laws. The
Speaker 1: last week of December, the team flew down to Myrtle Beach,
Speaker 1: South Carolina for the Beach Ball Classic. Now usually when
Speaker 1: you think of Myrtle Beach, you think of golf courses,
Speaker 1: but the Beach Ball Classic was a major event in
Speaker 1: high school basketball and eight team tournament that featured some
Speaker 1: of the best players in America. One of them was
Speaker 1: Lester Earl, a six ft eight jumping jack who ended
Speaker 1: up playing at L s U and Kansas. Another was
Speaker 1: Mike Bibby, a point guard who was the second pick
Speaker 1: in the NBA draft in and ended up playing in
Speaker 1: the league for fourteen years. Here's Scott County High School
Speaker 1: coach Billie Hicks talking about the Beach Ball Classic in
Speaker 1: two thousand four. Team, I'll tell you every time that
Speaker 1: we're we get a chance to play here, we really
Speaker 1: feel blessed because you know, there's a lot of great
Speaker 1: tournaments in America highscrew tournaments, but you know, nothing comes
Speaker 1: close to the Beach Ball But the biggest star at
Speaker 1: the Classic wasn't Lester Earl or Mike Biddy. It was Kobe.
Speaker 1: The Aces played three games in the tournament, and there
Speaker 1: were so many people flocking to Kobe that it was
Speaker 1: difficult for him to get to his family after each game.
Speaker 1: A couple of times that I started just pulling them
Speaker 1: back in the in the back room, in the locker room.
Speaker 1: Start talking to him then, because I think it's unfair
Speaker 1: for my family. Will wait. I saw all the autographs.
Speaker 1: I think, I think that's unfair. But when I stopped before,
Speaker 1: I started wising up and tell him the coming back
Speaker 1: so I can talk to him there. I came by
Speaker 1: the locker room and I just saw all these people
Speaker 1: saying I'm like, oh right, you know, teenagers, teenage boys,
Speaker 1: teenage girl. Oh man, it was guys, kind of crazy.
Speaker 1: But the escort just gave me a seat, so you know,
Speaker 1: you sit down as sign him if you want to,
Speaker 1: or you don't have to sign him at all. So
Speaker 1: show I said, now I have. I just said down
Speaker 1: that it's an auto autographs what I was doing. Honest,
Speaker 1: that's how many people about. He sounds like he's already
Speaker 1: used to all this attention, like this is just par
Speaker 1: for the course for him. Yes, of course people are
Speaker 1: going to want my autograph. Well it's a little unfair,
Speaker 1: but hey, that's the price of fame. It's one of
Speaker 1: the things that always strikes me about listening to these
Speaker 1: tapes of Kobe. He never seems overwhelmed by any of this,
Speaker 1: the attention, the pressure, the expectations, none of it. It
Speaker 1: was like this was a business trip, like this is
Speaker 1: what he was supposed to be doing with his life
Speaker 1: away from the convention center. Kobe stayed in his room
Speaker 1: a lot on the trip, sleeping, resting, thinking. He went
Speaker 1: out a few times at night with friends, but not
Speaker 1: that much. I know that you're gonna have options like
Speaker 1: that you either gonna go out, uh go swimming as
Speaker 1: an example, UH go party and go play video games
Speaker 1: and things like that. And for some people that may
Speaker 1: be relaxing. I know Michael Joyd likes to play golf
Speaker 1: for a game Magic miss as the music. I just
Speaker 1: like to sleep. I feel that I played very well.
Speaker 1: When I'm rested, I got my legs under me and
Speaker 1: I can run all day. So I just relaxed, turned
Speaker 1: the TV off and just swept in. But I enjoy thinking. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I thinking about the game. I was thinking about the
Speaker 1: moves I was gonna make. I was gonna tap the team.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna come out shooting and come out passing type
Speaker 1: moves I was gonna make. Can you see every game
Speaker 1: seems different for me. One game I'll come out and
Speaker 1: I feel like crossover move it was the best, and
Speaker 1: I feel maybe it's to pull up jump shot and
Speaker 1: fade away three. So I really got focused in it.
Speaker 1: We tried to think and and say, well, how do
Speaker 1: I feel now. I really thought about the game a lot,
Speaker 1: and I've also also thought about the future. It was
Speaker 1: no wonder so many people wanted Kobe's autograph and Laura
Speaker 1: Marion's first game at the Beach Ball Classic, a victory
Speaker 1: over a school from Ohio. He scored forty three points.
Speaker 1: It was a spectacular performance and Kobe was on his
Speaker 1: way to another one in the Aces. Next game, they
Speaker 1: were rolling against Jenks High School from Oklahoma, and Kobe
Speaker 1: had thirty one points when he made one bad decision
Speaker 1: and everything about the game and lower Marian's season changed.
Speaker 1: So I think we're on like ten twelve and he
Speaker 1: just growed in one against four and ah, he just
Speaker 1: he made a rare, really bad decision and guy jowing off,
Speaker 1: they drew the offensive foul, and he sat right next
Speaker 1: to me on the bench. Game went into overtime. We
Speaker 1: might have lost sixteen the two in the overtime. I
Speaker 1: don't know exactly what I think he was seventeen the two.
Speaker 1: I was close watching his teammates melt down in overtime.
Speaker 1: Kobe kept muttering the same phrase over and over again,
Speaker 1: just no goddamn independence, no goddamn independency to skip. Mike
Speaker 1: Egan described Kobe's reaction to the lowest It was after
Speaker 1: that game, one of the few times I saw Kobe
Speaker 1: really really lose his temper um. Where we sat in
Speaker 1: the locker room, and I said something again, guys, you
Speaker 1: you have to get better. You're not as good as
Speaker 1: you think you are. And the other coach is all.
Speaker 1: He says some more things, and Greg said, does anyone
Speaker 1: on the team have anything to say? And Kobe absolutely
Speaker 1: went off, screaming, yelling, you can't back down. He used
Speaker 1: foul language. He kept saying, you can't back down, you
Speaker 1: can't back down. You can't at him back down. Later
Speaker 1: that night, Greg Downer gathered the entire team in his
Speaker 1: hotel room and delivered a speech calling out each of
Speaker 1: the players, including Kobe. It sounds weird what could he
Speaker 1: possibly have complained about with respect to Kobe, But according
Speaker 1: to Treatment, he found something. You gotta understand the pressure
Speaker 1: of your teammates are feeling to playing with you, and
Speaker 1: you gotta bring the best out of them, and you
Speaker 1: gotta trust in them too. This to me, is an
Speaker 1: interesting moment in Kobe's development. All his life when it
Speaker 1: comes to basketball, the person he has listened to most
Speaker 1: is his father. Joe has been the biggest influence on him.
Speaker 1: But now out Greg Downer is challenging him in a
Speaker 1: way he's never been challenged before. Downer isn't saying Kobe,
Speaker 1: you have to make yourself better. He's saying, Kobe, you
Speaker 1: have to make your teammates better. As we know from
Speaker 1: the rest of Kobe's career, that wasn't necessarily the easiest
Speaker 1: thing for him to do, But Downer is telling him,
Speaker 1: we won't win if you don't do it. The approach
Speaker 1: worked right away. Inspired by downer speech, the Aces went
Speaker 1: out and won their third and final game in the tournament.
Speaker 1: Kobe scored forty three points in that one, took the
Speaker 1: Dunk Contest capped the Beach Ball Classic. It was the
Speaker 1: last event and Kobe desperately wanted to participate. There was
Speaker 1: one problem, though. Sometime during the tournament, he had injured
Speaker 1: his right wrist. It hadn't hurt badly enough that he
Speaker 1: couldn't play in the games, but much of his arm
Speaker 1: was wrapped in a big white bandage, like his arm
Speaker 1: belonged to a mummy. Tell me about the Dunk Contest, Well,
Speaker 1: there's all kinds of theories, conspiracy theories on white Kobe's
Speaker 1: risk was hurting them. Greg Simples to this day was
Speaker 1: from signing autographs. I thought he got hurt. I can't remember.
Speaker 1: It was probably a commodation. Lester Earl was going to
Speaker 1: be Kobe's biggest rival in the dunk contest. If Kobe
Speaker 1: could actually compete Shariah and Shaya, Kobe's sisters didn't want
Speaker 1: him to. They thought it was too risky. And I
Speaker 1: just remember sisters founding the door and I'm leading with Kobe,
Speaker 1: you're not dunking, You're not dunk here, and I'm like, hope,
Speaker 1: you don't need to do this. I remember saying like
Speaker 1: it's like I got this. What are you're kidding? Because
Speaker 1: I'm dunking And we've seen him dunk in a game,
Speaker 1: We've seen him dunk into practice, but we've never like
Speaker 1: seen him talk. No, no, Greg and no, nobody had
Speaker 1: seen this contest starts this Lester Earls doing ship that
Speaker 1: I've never seen from NBA players, and Kobe matches leading
Speaker 1: that the harder Lester all makes something because he was
Speaker 1: going first, then Kobe would do. For his last dunk,
Speaker 1: Earl jumped over a ball RADI. Each of the judges
Speaker 1: gave him a perfect tent. Technically, the best Kobe could
Speaker 1: do was tiring. No matter how good his final dunk
Speaker 1: was didn't matter. He asked three of his lower Marian
Speaker 1: teammates to stay in the lane just in front of
Speaker 1: the basket and duck their heads. And I remember looking
Speaker 1: at his sister's faces, like don't do it, don't do it,
Speaker 1: and he just jumped right over him dunk and he went.
Speaker 1: So yeah. Technically the contest was a tie, but everyone
Speaker 1: there in the Myrtle Beach Convention Center that night knew
Speaker 1: who had really want. I'm pretty sure he saw me.
Speaker 1: He winked. I mean that was just magic. Like God,
Speaker 1: this guy just can live up the hype on anything.
Speaker 1: It's like like he was hurt, he had no business
Speaker 1: dunk in, and he just goes and has a performance
Speaker 1: at lifetime. And that's why when I when I leave
Speaker 1: the very next year, when he entered in the in
Speaker 1: the dunk conscience is a rookie, NBA said, you've got this.
Speaker 1: I didn't even need to watch. I knew who's gonna in.
Speaker 1: As Jeremy and I sat by the bay on Long
Speaker 1: Beach Island and talked about Kobe. Almost twenty five years later,
Speaker 1: a few hundred yards away, at a house two doors down,
Speaker 1: three kids were playing in a small swimming pool. You
Speaker 1: probably heard their voices in the background while Jeremy was talking.
Speaker 1: They were playing right when we were talking about Kobe
Speaker 1: and Myrtle Beach, Kobe with the NBA plans, Kobe flying
Speaker 1: over his teammates despite a sore wrist to throw down
Speaker 1: an incredible dunk. Those voices were a nice reminder of
Speaker 1: the person Jeremy and I were talking about. We were
Speaker 1: talking about Kobe Bryant before he had played his first
Speaker 1: game with the Lakers, before he had even met Shaquille
Speaker 1: O'Neil or Phil Jackson or Pau Gasol, before he'd won
Speaker 1: five NBA championships and been a league MVP, before the
Speaker 1: battles and controversies with Shack and Phil, before he had
Speaker 1: become a husband and a father, before Eagle Colorado, before
Speaker 1: he had even accomplished everything he was going to accomplish
Speaker 1: in high school. We were talking about Kobe Bryant when
Speaker 1: he was just seventeen years old. We were talking about
Speaker 1: a kid. In the next episode, I'm going to tell
Speaker 1: you the story of how that kid pulled off one
Speaker 1: of his greatest feats as a high school basketball star.
Speaker 1: I saw it a message, so we be a championship day.
Speaker 1: How could player like this got stepping up with other bands.
Speaker 1: We knew that the is our time every week game
Speaker 1: you stepped up on the quarter That's next week on
Speaker 1: I Am Code. I Am Kobe is a production of
Speaker 1: The Version Podcasts, an association with I Heart Radio. This
Speaker 1: season is written and hosted by me Mike Sealskier. It's
Speaker 1: produced by Jacob Bronstein and directed by Mark Francis. Story
Speaker 1: editing by Jacob Bronstein with editorial direction from Scott Waxman, Editing,
Speaker 1: mixing and sound design by Mark Francis. Stephen Tompkins 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 Freesan Sinc.
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 Oran Rosenbaum,
Speaker 1: Susan Cannavan and Jeremy Treatment. The brisby Flo the Son
Speaker 1: and they don't want to stand when I say the
Speaker 1: blinds fall, and never clock you out even when my
Speaker 1: work is done. If they're trying to block me. I
Speaker 1: might hurt someone through the blood, sweat and tends. We perseveit,
Speaker 1: stay tilling it, let it keep the horses, and then
Speaker 1: if they don't believe in themselves, gave a vert to
Speaker 1: find now the tampons heads. So I'm telling them, ask
Speaker 1: my a, this the reason why my work so damn
Speaker 1: different to the negatives. I can't listen see me at
Speaker 1: the time, you can't listen for where I'm anna mote
Speaker 1: to play like cashes see I pay my dudes because
Speaker 1: taxes gotta work that they can grind ahead of his time.
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna saying that they made you. Don't tell
Speaker 1: them you create yourself the best Finn watch us, but
Speaker 1: by that time you gotta sneak clock, then break clock,
Speaker 1: break we create ourselves. Watch me quack, watch create myself.
Speaker 1: SAI signs up and create yourself. Stay nice, go hard,
Speaker 1: create yourself. You gotta learn from the great minds. So
Speaker 1: we ain't lying to tell them next get any time.
Speaker 1: This talent wasn't given. It was made. If future any
Speaker 1: time I can change better tell them that I made it.
Speaker 1: Back home, as I walked through the hearts of the fame,
Speaker 1: I came from the Valley of the Shadow with death
Speaker 1: waiting for us. Spoons, don't hold your breath, sat Town,
Speaker 1: sat Train. But I did it with less. I know
Speaker 1: one at the beach, so there's nothing to guess. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's nothing to guess. It's our times. Tell them we
Speaker 1: up next. We don't got any regrets. I did it
Speaker 1: with my soul hands and we never forget as my an.
Speaker 1: This the reason why my work so damn different to
Speaker 1: the negatives. I can't listen see me at the time.
Speaker 1: You can't listen for where red build, reach shape, give
Speaker 1: me your eye. You got to risk take do it now.
Speaker 1: When I'm saying why waves, I was saying that they
Speaker 1: made You'll tell them you create yourself the best you
Speaker 1: finn watch us, but it's bad that time. You gotta
Speaker 1: stay clock then break clock break. We create ourselves. I
Speaker 1: sweep quest right, sweeping to create myself. Exacts like that,
Speaker 1: sim self, create yourself, say nice and nain, go on,
Speaker 1: create yourself. You gotta learn from the great minds. But
Speaker 1: we ain't lying telling this game time Ye Diversion Podcasts