Speaker 1: Hey, welcome in. This is the All Ball Podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: Doug Gottlie Band. I'm joining you actually from Super Week,
Speaker 1: and you know, I thought about how to put together
Speaker 1: a Kobe podcast. Next week we'll have I've reached out
Speaker 1: to a couple of other people, and um, I you know,
Speaker 1: we have some really good guests lined up to talk
Speaker 1: some more Kobe. But I want to share with you
Speaker 1: guys a couple of things because one, I think it's
Speaker 1: cathartic too. I kind of got to know him and
Speaker 1: and and honestly, he was he actually had asked me
Speaker 1: to come on this podcast. And this is a weird
Speaker 1: thing in our business, you know when you make a friend.
Speaker 1: And Kobe and I weren't always friendly or friends or whatever.
Speaker 1: Like I didn't really know him. Um it's like we're
Speaker 1: like ships passing the night, like Los Angeles. Orange County
Speaker 1: is my hometown. Yet he moved into Newport Beach when
Speaker 1: I was you know, I was away college and then
Speaker 1: playing overseas, and you know, for the first was a
Speaker 1: twelve years out of college. You know, there's two thousand.
Speaker 1: I didn't live in southern California. I barely vacation in
Speaker 1: southern California. Just my in laws are in Oklahoma. We
Speaker 1: were we were east coast or traveling. I would would
Speaker 1: come out maybe once a year. But you know, I
Speaker 1: didn't thim a native Los Angeleo or native of Orange County.
Speaker 1: I didn't, um, you know, he he kind of dug
Speaker 1: roots in Orange County that I had already had and
Speaker 1: maybe it had been uplifted a little bit. So anyway, UM,
Speaker 1: I just here's kind of the my Kobe Bryant story.
Speaker 1: As we all kind of collectively grieve, and I think
Speaker 1: the grieving is multi layered. You're grieving the loss of
Speaker 1: Kobe Bryant. You're grieving, you know, for many people a
Speaker 1: basketball hero. What he become as an iconic figure um
Speaker 1: in the American sports lexicon in coming back from personal failures,
Speaker 1: right professional failures, and he was the picture of what
Speaker 1: what what work ethic is supposed to be. Like, what's
Speaker 1: amazing about Kobe Bryant is he's known for this Mama mentality.
Speaker 1: And this's a bunch of different ways in which people
Speaker 1: look at the MoMA mentality, but he's known for something
Speaker 1: in terms of his work ethic that goes counter to
Speaker 1: the stereotype of the son of a professional athlete. Right, Normally,
Speaker 1: the son of a professional athlete is supposed to be
Speaker 1: somebody who acts entitled. And there's there was some entitlement there,
Speaker 1: there was some arrogance there. There was a lot of
Speaker 1: confidence there obviously. But I think what's, um, what's what's
Speaker 1: fascinating about it is like, how many sons of NBA
Speaker 1: players don't work that hard because they were born with
Speaker 1: a silver spoon in their math, you know, born at
Speaker 1: their base and thought they hit a triple like that
Speaker 1: wasn't Kobe Bryant. He he didn't just want to make
Speaker 1: the NBA. He wanted to. He wanted to He wanted
Speaker 1: to rip everybody's heart out, that's what he want to do.
Speaker 1: And he wanted to just get better and better and
Speaker 1: better and didn't want to be an NBA player. He
Speaker 1: wanted to be the best NBA player. So here's my
Speaker 1: Kobe Bryant story. When I was at CBS, UM, I
Speaker 1: was driving home one night when the Eric Garner story
Speaker 1: kind of reached a peak. Right, that was the I
Speaker 1: can't breathe movement, And so a lot of like what
Speaker 1: happens I think with Twitter, with social media is that
Speaker 1: we tweet from like our perspective, our time, our moment,
Speaker 1: thinking everybody else sees it that way because that's our
Speaker 1: egocentric way of using social media to to like display
Speaker 1: our own kind of arrogance ecocentric nature. Right, that makes sense. Like,
Speaker 1: so I'm driving home through Manhattan and I think I
Speaker 1: either had a dinner or I was avoiding traffic. I
Speaker 1: can't remember how I got caught on. Like I'm gonna say,
Speaker 1: eighth Avenue or uh Avenue right, eighth Avenue. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: but eighth Avenue became shut down because there was a
Speaker 1: march marching across Eighth Avenue with the ie can't breathe,
Speaker 1: you know, I can't breathe movement, and I look, I'm
Speaker 1: no one's probe police brutality that I know. Um, I
Speaker 1: knew a little bit about the story. I knew that
Speaker 1: there was there was a lot to it, right. I
Speaker 1: just remember feeling super unsafe, super unsteady, just because I
Speaker 1: was a white dude in a I think I was
Speaker 1: in a GMC truck at the time, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: there's like people surrounding the car and like banging on
Speaker 1: the windows, and I was like, what what, I didn't
Speaker 1: do it. I'm just I'm trying to drive home now,
Speaker 1: i'd also carry then this is like a far avel.
Speaker 1: But like, look my childhood Eli Riots and I remember
Speaker 1: dudes getting hauled out of trucks and the ship kicked
Speaker 1: out of them, right, and I'm like, what what what
Speaker 1: happened here? So I mentioned the march and the people
Speaker 1: pounding on my windows in my car and kind of
Speaker 1: feeling super unsafe, and like I remember calling my wife like,
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm coming home, but like, I just gotta
Speaker 1: wait till this thing dies down before they opened up
Speaker 1: Eighth Avenue and she's like, what do you mean open
Speaker 1: it up? Like they're having this massive, massive march. She's
Speaker 1: just going on, you know, three or four or five
Speaker 1: thousand people walking across Eighth Avenue. I don't know they're
Speaker 1: walking to Times Square or where they were walking to anyway. Um,
Speaker 1: So I got home. I think it was that night
Speaker 1: or maybe the next night. And if you remember, the
Speaker 1: Lakers were playing, I'm gonna say I don't rememb where
Speaker 1: they're playing. Were they playing the heat? And Lebron was
Speaker 1: still on the heat I think, and they all had
Speaker 1: I can't breathe shirts on I remember I distinct remember
Speaker 1: Kobe and lebron with I can't breathe shirts and I
Speaker 1: can't breathe, while the idea behind it is to end
Speaker 1: police brutality. Right, the guy was selling cigarettes outside a
Speaker 1: liquor store for Christ's sake and he lost his life,
Speaker 1: Like it's crazy. So anyone who's reasonable is like, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know what the punishment should have been for
Speaker 1: a guy who's repeatedly selling bootlegs cigarettes, but dying is
Speaker 1: not even on the list of things. Right. On the
Speaker 1: other hand, like when you hear more about the story
Speaker 1: was it was the liquor store owner who's you know,
Speaker 1: doing trying to do things the right way and sell
Speaker 1: his own cigarettes and er gardener out front had been
Speaker 1: told to move. Who knows how many times he had moved?
Speaker 1: Like what do you do if you're a top right,
Speaker 1: you're much smaller than a guy he doesn't want to move.
Speaker 1: He's a gigantic man. He's like a known person personality,
Speaker 1: and he's not obeying your orders, Like what do you do?
Speaker 1: And I guess you probably just could have pepper sprayed
Speaker 1: him and moved him, right, Is that right? That's a
Speaker 1: non violent way. I don't believe anybody's ever died from
Speaker 1: pepper spray a little, you know, so you know, it
Speaker 1: looked like a chokehold to me. And then you know,
Speaker 1: the reports are that he and he had obviously had
Speaker 1: a weight problems, he had a heart attack, and then
Speaker 1: I mean the bigger thing was if you again, my
Speaker 1: memory of this is pretty uh, pretty thorough. I believe
Speaker 1: the bigger thing was that when the paramedics came, like,
Speaker 1: he's just laying there. Nobody performs CPR for however long. Right,
Speaker 1: there's a there's a layers. There's a layers to any story.
Speaker 1: But I do think that there was a good portion
Speaker 1: of people that put on the I Can Breathe shirt
Speaker 1: and the message was fucked the police. It just us. Look,
Speaker 1: I grew up listening to n w A. I've had
Speaker 1: anybody who's had a run in with a with a
Speaker 1: cop who's just a jerk, who's you know, who's feeling
Speaker 1: himself a little bit. He's got the badge, he's got
Speaker 1: the gun, he's the tough guy. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: I'd like to believe we live in a country where
Speaker 1: the greatest highest percentage of police officers are really just
Speaker 1: there you know, to keep the peace, to do their job,
Speaker 1: to go home safely and collect good benefits, right, like,
Speaker 1: let's be reasonable. So I was. I just I felt like,
Speaker 1: especially the class of NBA players, not they're not all
Speaker 1: this way, but look, NBA players, many of them are
Speaker 1: in fact protected by police, and Kobe was the perfect example.
Speaker 1: I had lived when I first moved to California, and
Speaker 1: I believe that was during the UH before the I
Speaker 1: Can Breathe movement. Right two thousand, two thou fourteen, I
Speaker 1: was living in in Orange County, and two thousand twelve
Speaker 1: and two thou thirty, I was living in Irvine, right
Speaker 1: on the border of Newport Coast, which is where Kobe lived.
Speaker 1: I would go to the same Starbucks and Code would
Speaker 1: just pull up and not even park, like you know,
Speaker 1: right out in front, tinted front window. Like in California.
Speaker 1: I I rolled up in my car, I tinted side
Speaker 1: windows like passenger side, driver's side. I got pulled over
Speaker 1: like three or four times. Finally I had to get
Speaker 1: the tent peeled off, tack me off like he had
Speaker 1: like Limo tinted front. Now, I'm not disputing that Kobe
Speaker 1: Bryant is a completely different realm of anybody else in
Speaker 1: the world in terms of Superstar. But like, look, dude,
Speaker 1: you're kind of part of the protected class. You live
Speaker 1: behind the gate. Nobody would ever mess with Kobe Bryant, especially,
Speaker 1: and that's why he lived in Newport, Newport Coast at
Speaker 1: the time. Was my belief was because he was part
Speaker 1: of protected class. So like a protected glass of people
Speaker 1: wearing a the police shirt, I felt like was a contradiction.
Speaker 1: And so I had some tweet I don't really remember
Speaker 1: what is. I'm sure I could Twitter search. You probably
Speaker 1: get Twitter search you want. And it was like, hey,
Speaker 1: how ironic. Kobe Bryant, who lives you know, you know
Speaker 1: it does what he wants, lives behind the gate. He's
Speaker 1: the one criticizing the police who protect him every day.
Speaker 1: So that nothing ever happens to Kobe. I tweet it.
Speaker 1: It doesn't go over well, you know, Twitter already fucking
Speaker 1: hates me. Um. And so now I become like a racist,
Speaker 1: which I'm not, and I'm a racist. I'm this, I'm that,
Speaker 1: I'm a right winger, I'm pro cop, I'm anti black people.
Speaker 1: Black lives matters, all that matters. I became blue lives matter.
Speaker 1: I don't even know. I I just kind of figured
Speaker 1: it was just a I'm a sports guy who was
Speaker 1: a sarcastic, kind of caustic sports tweet. It's when I
Speaker 1: specialized in. So Jason Whitlock at the time actually text
Speaker 1: me like, what what are you doing? This is not
Speaker 1: a place to joke. And I was like, oh, I
Speaker 1: take it down. So I just took it down, and
Speaker 1: you know, things go viral and they get crazy, and
Speaker 1: my bosses at CBS at the time like what are
Speaker 1: you doing? And I was like, it's just a tweet.
Speaker 1: Doesn't nobody got hurt by it. I didn't choke anybody out.
Speaker 1: So I called my friend Rick Buker, because Buke, going
Speaker 1: back to our days at ESPN, he had a he
Speaker 1: had a line to Kobe. When Kobe was first wanted
Speaker 1: to be traded, he talked to Buke. Um Buker had
Speaker 1: done a great job of establishing a relationship. I used
Speaker 1: to mess with him that you could barely see Kobe's
Speaker 1: lips moving when Rick Buker talked, but he thought it
Speaker 1: was funny, and I knew that was my best way
Speaker 1: into Kobe. So I called him and I was like, hey, man,
Speaker 1: can you give me Kobe's number? He's like why. I
Speaker 1: was like, I put on a tweet and he's like, oh,
Speaker 1: I saw it was funny. I go, yeah, I'm not
Speaker 1: sure Kobe thinks it's funny. So I'm gonna I'm gonna
Speaker 1: apologize in a text. Yeah. He's like, just text him.
Speaker 1: He's a text guy. So I texted him. We text
Speaker 1: back and I was like, hey, man, I just want
Speaker 1: to tell you I have put out a tweet. Um,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't. I didn't. There was a little bit of
Speaker 1: truth to it because our kids had gone Our kids
Speaker 1: had gone to school together for a year at a
Speaker 1: school called Harbor Day and Giohn was very little at
Speaker 1: the time, like in um, say, second grade, and our
Speaker 1: girls were all together in second grade. I have I
Speaker 1: have twin daughters exact same age, and so when we
Speaker 1: knew each other a little bit. Um anyway, I was like, hey, sorry.
Speaker 1: He was like no, he text me back, no problem
Speaker 1: at all, don't worry about it. So fast forward two
Speaker 1: years later from that point and I actually moved back
Speaker 1: to Orange County, and the reason we moved back to
Speaker 1: honestly renting the same house we had rented the time before.
Speaker 1: Was we wanted because we're moving so much with our kids,
Speaker 1: we wanted them to be in the same school. So
Speaker 1: my daughters got back into Harbor Day. My son did not,
Speaker 1: and just because I didn't have space, and all was
Speaker 1: good and I kind of reconnected with They have a
Speaker 1: big opening kick pick Dick or whatever. And Kobe was
Speaker 1: there and he had a The year that we were
Speaker 1: there before was the eory towards Kill, his tenant, and
Speaker 1: he was always at the school, always, always, always, and
Speaker 1: so um it was interesting that like my daughters who
Speaker 1: didn't know anything about Kobe Bryant, just knew Kobe because
Speaker 1: he was always around, like serving lunches at their school,
Speaker 1: like one day a week, and like field trips occasionally
Speaker 1: go on, and you know, he started running Mamba volleyball
Speaker 1: back then for his older daughter. Anyway, Um, so I
Speaker 1: said hi to him, and you know, we explained, exchanged
Speaker 1: pleasant trees. And Rob Polinka's kids also go to that
Speaker 1: exact go to that school as well, and this is
Speaker 1: this is going back, this is uh, I don't know,
Speaker 1: was it three years ago, yeah, almost two and a
Speaker 1: half years ago. So we started kind of a text
Speaker 1: relationship and Gianna asked my daughter Harper to play on
Speaker 1: Mama's basketball team, and I think they played a pe
Speaker 1: and Harper was super intimidated by Gianna in basketball. She's like,
Speaker 1: Gianna is the nicest kid ever. And just for the record,
Speaker 1: so people understand, there are kids that are sons and
Speaker 1: daughters of a rich important people that are jerks, are
Speaker 1: little assholes, right, Gianna Brian is not among those people.
Speaker 1: She was a sweetheart. Like I had two daughters there,
Speaker 1: uh both one was definitely getting a little bullied. Um,
Speaker 1: one was kind of getting bullied, and Gianna was the
Speaker 1: one who She's the kid who, like you see in
Speaker 1: an after school special, like she would step in like
Speaker 1: this is again part of my girls. She would step
Speaker 1: in and say like no, this is You're not gonna
Speaker 1: treat anybody poorly like she's she's a she was a
Speaker 1: great kid, great um and apple trees make apples, right,
Speaker 1: So it speaks to Vanessa, it speaks to Kobe and
Speaker 1: how they raised her. Of course she's my daughter. Harper
Speaker 1: would say, like, I'm not playing basketball Gianna because when
Speaker 1: you play with her, I drink pa. She's like a
Speaker 1: different person, Like she flips the switch kind of like remember, um,
Speaker 1: over the top, remember Sylvester Stallone's character, and over the top,
Speaker 1: like when he turned his hat to the back, he'd
Speaker 1: become a different guy. That's how Gianna Bryant was when
Speaker 1: she played bass play basketball, So she didn't play the
Speaker 1: basketball team. She kind of kicked herself for it. And then,
Speaker 1: you know, if you know anything about Mamba early on
Speaker 1: when it started, you know, it's just a bunch of
Speaker 1: girls from Harbor Day and Newport Beach and it was
Speaker 1: just a little club team and they got smashed by
Speaker 1: another team. And Kobe was he wasn't embarrassed that they
Speaker 1: got smashed. It was that they didn't know how to
Speaker 1: play basketball like that. He's like, they're not playing back
Speaker 1: like anybody who's watched AU. It's like, you know, if
Speaker 1: a team is bad, you can't drow, we can't pass cans.
Speaker 1: She just doesn't look right. And he was like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we're not playing in a tournaments. We're gonna do six months,
Speaker 1: five days a week of just teaching you how to play,
Speaker 1: and then we'll play tournaments. And so that's what happened.
Speaker 1: That's how Mamba the basketball things started. And obviously, Gianna,
Speaker 1: you've practiced that much he hired Christina Mauser Mauser, who
Speaker 1: was the p teacher, to be one of her coaches.
Speaker 1: He hired other coaches as well to come in and
Speaker 1: work with his his girls, and soon enough they became
Speaker 1: the best team in southern California, the same team to
Speaker 1: beat in by forty. They smashed by forty like the
Speaker 1: next time they played. So our friendships started really because
Speaker 1: our kids went to the same school, and he was like, hey,
Speaker 1: you know, Harvard Day Dad, we should get We should
Speaker 1: get together with a bunch of Harvard Day dudes and
Speaker 1: all the parents. They are really pretty cool, and so
Speaker 1: first it was like, hey, we gotta range schedules. And
Speaker 1: then I actually we took one of my daughters, Grace,
Speaker 1: out of the school. She was struggling academically. And then
Speaker 1: Harper didn't love like the social scene just because she
Speaker 1: didn't play basketball Gianna, so her friend group was like
Speaker 1: one or two other girls, and she's just like, I
Speaker 1: want to go to a big public school anyway. So
Speaker 1: I was part of me was a little embarrassing, like
Speaker 1: does he want to get together with me just because
Speaker 1: my kid goes to school with his kid or do
Speaker 1: we have a legit relationship and I actually texted him
Speaker 1: and asked him and said, hey, dude, just so you know,
Speaker 1: like I think we're pulling my girl out of harbor day.
Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, we're still good though, right. I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: So anyway, spring of now spring at two thous eighteen
Speaker 1: or maybe nineteen, I remember, Um, I remember getting a
Speaker 1: text from him because we had we had talked a
Speaker 1: bunch on text come uh once on the phone, a
Speaker 1: couple of times in person and events, and we're like,
Speaker 1: we gotta get it to get a good drinks. Sends
Speaker 1: me a text, and we had missed each other in
Speaker 1: other texts in terms of getting together. There's a place
Speaker 1: called Javier's. If you listen to Jim Rome show, Jim
Speaker 1: kind of made the thing popular. Um it's uh, it's
Speaker 1: now become a chain. It's a high end masking place,
Speaker 1: good drinks, and Kobe has his own drink, the Momba there.
Speaker 1: So he's like, hey, Javiers like seven thirty. So here's
Speaker 1: my I'm not gonna tell you everything that happened, but um,
Speaker 1: this is like a night with Kobe, just me and him.
Speaker 1: So my wife is a little weird out by it
Speaker 1: because she's like Why does he wanted? Why does he
Speaker 1: want to talk to you? Like I don't know the
Speaker 1: guys get together and have drinks. She's like, I don't.
Speaker 1: I did. Why would he just wanted? Like he has friends,
Speaker 1: you're not as friends, like we've actually been kind of friends,
Speaker 1: like text friends. That's not a real friend. I was like,
Speaker 1: all right, fine, So I assumed I'm gonna show up.
Speaker 1: There's be a bunch of some other like Harvard Ay dads,
Speaker 1: some other dads. I know, a couple of other dudes
Speaker 1: that are you know, like um one of the guys
Speaker 1: that died Alto Belly Alta is like everyone knows him.
Speaker 1: He has been the junior college baseball coach at oc
Speaker 1: C Orange Coast College forever. Like I just figured I
Speaker 1: walk into a room and they'll be those kind of
Speaker 1: guys and we'd all be bullshitting having to a couple
Speaker 1: of drinks. So I walk into Javier's and I was like,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go to the bathroom first. Now he might
Speaker 1: be asking like why would you go to the bathroom first? Well,
Speaker 1: I just thought, like if I get engaged in a
Speaker 1: conversation with Kobe Bryant, like I don't wanna have to
Speaker 1: go pee, and like then, you know how guys are,
Speaker 1: like you lose your train of thought, you move on
Speaker 1: somebody else at the table, the conversation never starts again.
Speaker 1: I'm not a clinger, just the reality of I would
Speaker 1: have to be at some point. I remember going pe
Speaker 1: washing my hands and walking out and expecting to walk
Speaker 1: into the back part of Javier is gonna be a
Speaker 1: bunch of dudes there, and it's like Kobe Bryant sitting
Speaker 1: by himself, almost like it was a blind date. And uh,
Speaker 1: we talked for we talked for hours, and the conversation
Speaker 1: started talking about basketball and about how basketball should be taught,
Speaker 1: and so I said, you know, he told me a
Speaker 1: little bit about when he first started playing in Italy
Speaker 1: and how he was taught, and he didn't really know.
Speaker 1: He knew my dad had been a you coached locally,
Speaker 1: but he didn't know like made my dad coach in
Speaker 1: college and all the different ties and um, so we
Speaker 1: just started talking about teaching kids. And this is where
Speaker 1: like he kind of won me that night, like he
Speaker 1: had already won me over based upon his text and
Speaker 1: the fact he was just he started to become like
Speaker 1: an he's still a superstar and superstars do things just differently.
Speaker 1: But there was a real human being and a pretty
Speaker 1: good and I was like, man, this guy's a good dude.
Speaker 1: Like we started talking about how to how to coach,
Speaker 1: now to teach kids and and here's kind of my story.
Speaker 1: So when we moved back to Orange County, I wanted
Speaker 1: my son to get in some workouts. And there's a
Speaker 1: guy named Shae Freeze who uh shay is a works
Speaker 1: for Bill Duffy. He's a very good workout coach. You
Speaker 1: good basketball player in his own right. I think D
Speaker 1: three up in uh Washington and he was running a
Speaker 1: program called point Break. So um, my longtime friend Dylan
Speaker 1: Rigg didn who played a U s Irvine and an
Speaker 1: Arizona and then played in Australia. He has uh two
Speaker 1: older kids kid named walk. His son Joaquin is two
Speaker 1: years older than my son. He was like, hey, wha,
Speaker 1: kinos this point break? Bring Hayes to a workout. So
Speaker 1: I go. And they were really good, but their teams
Speaker 1: were ship like. They literally every tournament they play in
Speaker 1: they get beat by thirty forty points because they couldn't
Speaker 1: pass and they couldn't play together. And yeah they could
Speaker 1: all Eurostep and they had some advanced moves, but they
Speaker 1: didn't pivot well. And you know, after doing this for
Speaker 1: like two months, three months, and Hayes played up and
Speaker 1: played in a couple of games and he's one very
Speaker 1: good at time. Full disclosure. Uh Shade texted me after
Speaker 1: a workout and he's like, what do you think? And
Speaker 1: I was like, well, say, when are you gonna do passing?
Speaker 1: When are you gonna do pivoting? What are you gonna do?
Speaker 1: You know, some of their work on their defensive form
Speaker 1: and their positioning, it's like, should we do that? Like yeah,
Speaker 1: it's actually the first they just skip steps. It's like
Speaker 1: they taught kids how to run and forgot that you
Speaker 1: have to walk first, or even crawl before you walk.
Speaker 1: So I kind of took over and started coaching a team.
Speaker 1: When we started competing and winning. And then fast forward
Speaker 1: to the next year, Say struggled to get a gym,
Speaker 1: and so I got a gym and eventually kind of
Speaker 1: absorbed the program, turned it into my dad's name sake,
Speaker 1: which was Branch West, and now we have workouts. So
Speaker 1: I was telling Kobe, like, dude, they don't know how
Speaker 1: to pivot. They don't know how to pass, they don't
Speaker 1: know how to screen, and here we are teaching how
Speaker 1: to fucking eurostep, you know, and how to do all
Speaker 1: this fancy ship that they see in transition in the
Speaker 1: NBA played downhill, Like, you can't play downhill if you
Speaker 1: can't break a press, can't play downhill if you don't
Speaker 1: know how to actually set a ball screen. You know,
Speaker 1: you can't play downhill if you can't play without the
Speaker 1: ball as well as with the ball in terms of
Speaker 1: spacing and getting your feet ready, in your hands ready,
Speaker 1: and your body ready for the ball when you catch
Speaker 1: and you can shoot. And he's like, exactly, So he
Speaker 1: started telling me his story. We started we're talking ball.
Speaker 1: Then he like switches to talking about the Wizarding Series
Speaker 1: or whatever it's called. And look, you know, when you
Speaker 1: sit with somebody like, oh god, this guy's he's smarter
Speaker 1: than me. And I like to think that I'm pretty
Speaker 1: smart guys. I do like being in rooms where I'm
Speaker 1: I'm the dumbest guy in I was the dumber guy
Speaker 1: in the conversation because in the midst of talking about basketball,
Speaker 1: talking about kids, talking about life, getting to know each other,
Speaker 1: and by the way, I just want to fold disclosure.
Speaker 1: The first thing I said when we first started talking was, hey,
Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember by I sent you
Speaker 1: a text about a tweet that I had and go
Speaker 1: back in the I can't breathe. And he looked at me,
Speaker 1: do you remember the do you remember that Kobe Jalen
Speaker 1: Rose commercial where he ordered eighty one olives these Now
Speaker 1: I'm just kidding anyway, there was the before that. Jalen's like, hey,
Speaker 1: I said, I put this thing out on Twitter. Is like, man,
Speaker 1: I'll pay attention that ship, right he It was the
Speaker 1: exact line. That's exactly what he said to me, is like, seriously,
Speaker 1: I don't care, Like I wouldn't have invited to drinks
Speaker 1: if I gave a ship about a tweet three years
Speaker 1: ago about I can't Breathe don't care like cool. So um,
Speaker 1: He's switches to talking about his books, podcasts, movies, his
Speaker 1: vision for this thing. And I was like, you had
Speaker 1: a lot of time to think about this. He's like,
Speaker 1: I don't know how, Like I'm a storyteller. This was
Speaker 1: when I was in school, Like I couldn't. I was
Speaker 1: I want to be like an English teacher, write books
Speaker 1: or whatever. And one of his I mentioned there's five movies.
Speaker 1: That was because at some point in the conversation like
Speaker 1: what are your five favorite movies? And there's like Godfather,
Speaker 1: there was um uh Steel Magnolia's, which I was like,
Speaker 1: really Harry Potter, Um, I'll remember the other two in
Speaker 1: a second. I remember Harry Potter. And he's like, I'm
Speaker 1: telling you this should be bigger than Harry Potter because
Speaker 1: there's so many He was telling about these different worlds
Speaker 1: and different wizards and different age groups it sells to,
Speaker 1: and how it could eventually be an amusement park, and
Speaker 1: I was like, dude, you've really thought this thing out.
Speaker 1: He's like, what do you think I do all day?
Speaker 1: I go, I don't know. What do you do? Is
Speaker 1: like I get up at four in the morning, I
Speaker 1: go work out at Equinox, and you know, um, he
Speaker 1: takes his older daughter works out with him, and then
Speaker 1: he comes back and um, he has breakfast and he helps,
Speaker 1: you know, get kids up and ready and go to school,
Speaker 1: and then he goes to his office and he works,
Speaker 1: you know, and he's got he's a venture capitalist as
Speaker 1: well as he's got the books in the podcast, and
Speaker 1: then he's also got mamba and he does this other investments.
Speaker 1: I was like, dude, this guy's unbelievable. And like I said,
Speaker 1: like the more you know how guys can use big
Speaker 1: words and they're not really smart and they use them
Speaker 1: out of context. So Kobe Bryant, We're having all these
Speaker 1: conversations and people come up and everyone who works at
Speaker 1: the restaurant is bilingual. Guess who else is bilingual? Kobe Bryant, Right, So,
Speaker 1: like it's one thing to order a mamba and say,
Speaker 1: you know those mamba sport famular, but like to have
Speaker 1: a full on conversation with guys that work on the
Speaker 1: restaurant in Spanish and then turn around and be right
Speaker 1: back in the conversation about the Wizarding Series or whatever.
Speaker 1: You're like, holy sh it, this dude's brain is on fire. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: I got like four drinks in me and I'm just
Speaker 1: sitting here going I can't believe I'm talking to Kobe Bryant.
Speaker 1: So we talked about basketball, We started talking about Lebron,
Speaker 1: We started talking about Mike. I shared this story on radio.
Speaker 1: It's that this is he said this to me several
Speaker 1: times about how um the mom mentality is also kind
Speaker 1: of a derivation of some of the things he read
Speaker 1: about warriors and samurais and Phil Jackson actually taught him.
Speaker 1: And he's like, you know, the thing that I learned
Speaker 1: from Phil and through all my studies and reading, is like,
Speaker 1: when you're at war, it's full scale psychological warfare, right
Speaker 1: like any of these leaders of countries, even our own,
Speaker 1: in order to get all the soldiers to buy in,
Speaker 1: it's full scale psychological warfare. He is like, I believe that.
Speaker 1: In basketball. I was like, all right, He's like, that's
Speaker 1: why I could. That's why Mike knows. He can't funk
Speaker 1: with me, like we you mean, Mike can't funk with you,
Speaker 1: like is Michael Jordan? Dude? And and at this point
Speaker 1: one we had established a friendship too. I had some
Speaker 1: drinks in me, he had some drinks in him, and
Speaker 1: you know, I was like, look, dude, I love you.
Speaker 1: I think you're unbelievable, you know, top ten all time player,
Speaker 1: but you tried to talk and walk like Michael Jordan
Speaker 1: and play like Michael Jordan's like, let's be honest, my
Speaker 1: Mike's the goat. He's like, yeah, okay, but he can't
Speaker 1: work with me because I would use full scale psychological warfare.
Speaker 1: I said, Kobe, what are you gonna say to Michael
Speaker 1: Jordan that hasn't already been said in terms of trash talk.
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, his dad loved Larry More. I
Speaker 1: was like, what what it's like, you know Larry. I
Speaker 1: was like, yeah, Larry Jordan. His younger brother was only
Speaker 1: his older brother was only six ft tall. Mike was
Speaker 1: the only guy who sprouted up in his family. It's like,
Speaker 1: he's like, it was always a thing that Mike thought
Speaker 1: his dad loved Larry Moore, and he probably treated him
Speaker 1: that way because Larry never grew, he didn't have the
Speaker 1: god given gifts that that Mike had. I was like,
Speaker 1: so you would say that. He's like, yeah, full skill
Speaker 1: psychological warfare. I was like wow. So we started talking
Speaker 1: about Lebron and he's like, yeah, Lebron, you know he
Speaker 1: wants to have this mentality, but it's just not in
Speaker 1: his makeup, Like he just he just isn't. He ain't
Speaker 1: like us all the time, and he's broke through some
Speaker 1: of it, but he hasn't always broken through. He's like
Speaker 1: and he's like, I've never had the problem taking the
Speaker 1: big shot or missing the big shot that didn't bother me.
Speaker 1: He's like, where Lebron like he he gets the most
Speaker 1: joy out of making having somebody else make the shot.
Speaker 1: He's like, which, I'm just that is just not how
Speaker 1: I'm white. We're wired so differently as people. But he
Speaker 1: also told me that, like, look, I old Lebron and
Speaker 1: this was Lebron was playing in the NBA Finals for
Speaker 1: with the with the calves at the point, at that
Speaker 1: point in time we're close to playing, He's like, dude,
Speaker 1: I told him he needs to get in the post more,
Speaker 1: you know, he needs to roll down to the post
Speaker 1: and needs to simplify his game really work on just
Speaker 1: playing out the post, passing on the post, scoring out
Speaker 1: the posts. He's gotta become a bucket get get, get
Speaker 1: a fade away, go and use his body like play
Speaker 1: from the elbow as well. And then he started talking
Speaker 1: about other guys in the NBA that he kind of
Speaker 1: like secretly works with. And this is probably the part
Speaker 1: that you're starting to hear stories about on social media
Speaker 1: that Kobe Bryant, who most people half America thought was
Speaker 1: an asshole for a long time, and he probably probably
Speaker 1: maybe he was, like if you were seventeen years old
Speaker 1: and you're a kid and a millionaire and son of
Speaker 1: a pro, and all of a sudden you're playing in
Speaker 1: l A with Shaquille O'Neal. Like, you'll probably be a
Speaker 1: jerk sometimes too, write you'd probably be entitled, Mike, wouldn't
Speaker 1: you like the world fell at your feet? We watched
Speaker 1: him grow up and evolved, But he so did a
Speaker 1: lot of things for people, and he wanted nothing in return.
Speaker 1: But he wanted no PR like their stories coming out
Speaker 1: about going and seeing sick kids and cancer awards. But
Speaker 1: he told would tell the parents, you know, like, listen,
Speaker 1: this is not about PR. This is about your kid.
Speaker 1: There's lots of stories like that. The same is true
Speaker 1: with the workouts with players and the texts with players
Speaker 1: and the calls to players. Like he loved ball. He'd
Speaker 1: watch it and then he'd send a guy a text.
Speaker 1: Here's something I saw and like anybody who sees a
Speaker 1: text from Kobe Bryant's gonna read it, and like, damn,
Speaker 1: Kobe Bryant's watching my game. I would guess there are
Speaker 1: fifty guys in the NBA that have texts out saved
Speaker 1: on their phone from Kobe Bryant where he's like, dude,
Speaker 1: you need to do this more, you need to do that,
Speaker 1: or now that they had momb Academy they start working together.
Speaker 1: He just did things like that, which brings me around
Speaker 1: to why he was never on the podcast. When Lebron
Speaker 1: signed with the Lakers, Kobe came on. I was guest
Speaker 1: hosting The Dan Patrick Show me and Jason Smith, and
Speaker 1: I text him like, hey, dude, this is not why
Speaker 1: we're friends. Will you come on? It's like absolutely, And
Speaker 1: then I just didn't want to ask him a podcast
Speaker 1: because that wasn't why we were friends. I didn't want
Speaker 1: to use a friendship. Not that people are on the
Speaker 1: podcast aren't really friends. They are, but I don't know,
Speaker 1: I just felt weird about it. I just felt like
Speaker 1: I would be that guy who is only befriending Kobe
Speaker 1: Bryant and sending you know, he's sending me videos of
Speaker 1: different sets they're running out of Triangle and new things
Speaker 1: that he's putting in, you know, because I want him
Speaker 1: on my podcast to get downloads, to make more money.
Speaker 1: Like I just didn't That's not how I wanted wanted
Speaker 1: to be. UM. So now I sit here, I don't
Speaker 1: know five days removed from Kobe Bryant's helicopter crashing and
Speaker 1: him tragically dying with eight other people, several others who uh,
Speaker 1: somebody my family knew really really well. And I'm bummed
Speaker 1: because I could have had a great audio record of
Speaker 1: an interesting conversation. I don't know. I'm I've been really
Speaker 1: sad with this. And again I'm not gonna lie to you.
Speaker 1: I was not best friends with Kobe Bryant. I never
Speaker 1: went over to his house. He never came out to
Speaker 1: my house, although he was It was at one point
Speaker 1: in time there was a text from him was like
Speaker 1: when we when are we getting the invite to watch
Speaker 1: games of your house? And you know, we bought a
Speaker 1: house like a year ago or two years ago, and
Speaker 1: we've been process of redoing it and the last thing
Speaker 1: we want is like Kobe Bryant coming over during a remote.
Speaker 1: All right, but he would have been cool. We've been fine.
Speaker 1: So there's other stuff. Um. He he was interesting and
Speaker 1: that he really understood the psychology of players. He he
Speaker 1: likes Shack, and I think Shack understood. I think, at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, I don't know Shack actually
Speaker 1: understands why they the Lakers chose him over Shack. Um,
Speaker 1: I think most of the basketball world does. Shack was great,
Speaker 1: Chack was dominant. Shack could have been the best player
Speaker 1: in the history of the NBA. But Chack likes to
Speaker 1: have fun, like to have a good time, you know,
Speaker 1: would work in basket on basketball and basketball season, whereas
Speaker 1: Kobe like this. He was a professional basketball player. He
Speaker 1: was a licensed killer and he spent the offseason thinking
Speaker 1: about how he's gonna kill people in the regular season,
Speaker 1: where Shack would use training camp an early season to
Speaker 1: get in shape. That's why he wasn't the league's MVP
Speaker 1: off it, even though he was the most dominant player
Speaker 1: in the league. And he kind of worked together for
Speaker 1: a long long time. Obviously, some of the comments that
Speaker 1: they made about each other started to to to break,
Speaker 1: started to make a fissure with it within the two. So, Um,
Speaker 1: maybe I've rambled on this, but I'll tell you this.
Speaker 1: Like one, he loved basketball. Kobe Bryant loved understood basketball.
Speaker 1: It wasn't the only thing he wanted to do in
Speaker 1: this next version of himself, but he really loved the
Speaker 1: art of what basketball is. He was kind of a recluse.
Speaker 1: He was a bit of a loner. He was a
Speaker 1: little awkward. He did to have a tency to befriend
Speaker 1: the bottom guy and the totem pole. Maybe because that
Speaker 1: guy would never kind of challenge his authority. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Um I didn't get a chance to know him well
Speaker 1: enough where I could ask him why he was how
Speaker 1: he was earlier in his life. I can also tell
Speaker 1: you this, When I was young and at ESPN, like,
Speaker 1: I had a friend of mine who's an agent and
Speaker 1: endeavor say like, you know, god like, but I kind
Speaker 1: of like, I really like you now. I met you
Speaker 1: when you're like twenties and ESPN, and I didn't like
Speaker 1: you like I feel like I've been the same guys like, nah,
Speaker 1: you're much better now. I think the same can be
Speaker 1: said for Kobe. Maybe that's what I see in him,
Speaker 1: Maybe that's what we all see in him. Is he
Speaker 1: was a guy who went from being sometimes a punk,
Speaker 1: sometimes entitled, sometimes aloof to a dad and the dad
Speaker 1: of girls, which I have twin girls that are thirteen
Speaker 1: years old. And not only that, chill you out. It
Speaker 1: gives you a different perspective and and you become much
Speaker 1: more relatable. You know, I'll share with you more in
Speaker 1: future PROD podcasts about him. UM, I don't think the
Speaker 1: logo of the NBA should change for Kobe Bryant. And
Speaker 1: this is not to say it wasn't a great player,
Speaker 1: but you know, like, if it's not gonna be Jordan's, UM,
Speaker 1: what Jerry West's logo is perfect. Jerry West is the
Speaker 1: only player in the history of the NBA to be
Speaker 1: the to the finals MVP and his team not win.
Speaker 1: That's how good he was. And he averaged forty points
Speaker 1: a game in UM. You know, I I think it's
Speaker 1: knee jerk, but it is. It's he was the generations Jordan's.
Speaker 1: And one of the things that Lebron has fought is
Speaker 1: how Kobe was, how Jordan was, was how I grew up.
Speaker 1: The best player was supposed to be and and here's
Speaker 1: what I mean. Kobe would guard the other team's best player,
Speaker 1: and he wanted the ball and was willing to take
Speaker 1: and even miss the game winning shot. For for the
Speaker 1: life of me, as long as I've played basketball, once
Speaker 1: you start playing pick up, you know, you could do
Speaker 1: a pickup game. And anybody's ever played ball with magic.
Speaker 1: Matt Johnson's the greatest Laker ever unbelievable passer, but Magic
Speaker 1: Johnson the end of a pickup game, the end of
Speaker 1: an NBA game, you gave the ball to Magic and
Speaker 1: he was gonna go make a play. The bank shot
Speaker 1: in Boston, the hook shot in Boston. Uh. Obviously Magic
Speaker 1: was a great passer, but he was a licensed killer
Speaker 1: at the end of games. And Magic was a bad defender,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't afraid to guard whoever the other team's
Speaker 1: best player was. That's what we were taught great the
Speaker 1: greatest of great two. That's what Jordan did. That's what
Speaker 1: Bird did. That is frankly what Kobe Bryant did. And
Speaker 1: so what Lebron has fought is like Lebron's like, look,
Speaker 1: I'll take whatever the best shot is. I love creating
Speaker 1: shots for other people. You double team, and that's hard.
Speaker 1: And and there have been times when he wasn't guarded
Speaker 1: the other team's best player, or he has and he
Speaker 1: got lit up by Kevin Durant. But I think it's
Speaker 1: that's part of the mentality of the true basketball Alpha
Speaker 1: and why he was so admired by NBA players, because
Speaker 1: he was fearless at both ends, even to a fault
Speaker 1: when he would take bad shots like Game seven of
Speaker 1: the NBA Finals. I can't attest to how he was
Speaker 1: every hour of every day or how he treated you,
Speaker 1: but I do. I live in a community that I
Speaker 1: shared with with Kobe Bryant, and um, he had some
Speaker 1: run ins with parents, as anybody who runs an AU
Speaker 1: program does. But I do believe that he had the
Speaker 1: best intentions at heart of Hey, if you're in, you're in.
Speaker 1: If you're not, you're not, I mean wanting. There's a
Speaker 1: couple of girls that he he cut from the team
Speaker 1: because whether it's injury or other sports, they weren't making
Speaker 1: practice is and um, I actually understand it, Like I
Speaker 1: would love to do that with my program for some
Speaker 1: of these kids. I just my program, isn't it. I
Speaker 1: don't have his unlimited resources. I don't have, you know,
Speaker 1: ten kids that I can go the you too, you
Speaker 1: can't show up, you're out, you don't play. I would like,
Speaker 1: you know a lot of people would like to run
Speaker 1: their AU program the way that Kobe did. We just
Speaker 1: don't have the resources, need the kids. You know, can't
Speaker 1: bid a dude to kids or that's not And I'm
Speaker 1: and I'm a pretty hard line guy. Um. So I
Speaker 1: can't vouch from in every aspect of his life, I
Speaker 1: can tell you this. He impressed me as a guy.
Speaker 1: He was incredibly bright, he loved basketball, loved loved basketball.
Speaker 1: Um and the Mamba mentality was more than I want
Speaker 1: to take and make the big shot. To me, the
Speaker 1: MoMA mentality was really this vote uh which I saw
Speaker 1: and I'm just I continue to kind of marvel in.
Speaker 1: This is from Cobe Ryan. I have self doubt. I
Speaker 1: have insecurity. I have fear of failure. I have nights
Speaker 1: when I show up at the arena and I'm like,
Speaker 1: my back hurts, my feet hurt, my knees hurt. I
Speaker 1: don't have it. I just want to chill. We all
Speaker 1: have self doubt. We don't deny it. You don't deny it,
Speaker 1: but you don't capitulate to it. You embrace it. I
Speaker 1: try and teach my kids about that as well. With
Speaker 1: the same thing with jealousy, Like, jealousy is not a
Speaker 1: bat not a terrible thing, and it's you can't deny
Speaker 1: that you have it. It's what does jealousy make you do?
Speaker 1: Does make you do some mean to somebody else, or
Speaker 1: does it make you work hard so that you can
Speaker 1: get what they have, all right, It's okay to be jealous,
Speaker 1: that's all right. Does that fuel you as motivation? You know?
Speaker 1: Does uh insecurity fuel you or does it make you
Speaker 1: shut down? That's the true Mama meant that's the true
Speaker 1: mama mentality, you know. Because Kobe as a player could
Speaker 1: be selfish, could be self aggrandizing, could be arrogant and aloof.
Speaker 1: But the good parts of Kobe, and the parts that
Speaker 1: came out more and more, were about work ethic, about
Speaker 1: finding a way to use what other people see as
Speaker 1: negatives to fuel you to ultimately become a positive. And uh, look,
Speaker 1: we have lots of athletes post career success stories like
Speaker 1: Lebron will eventually be And there's champions of business. Shakill
Speaker 1: is a champion in business, Drew Brees and Peyton Manning
Speaker 1: champions in business, and there are more plenty more where
Speaker 1: they use their money and their wealth to buy into
Speaker 1: other businesses and they create ridiculous generational wealth if they
Speaker 1: didn't already have it. That stuff is amazing. But to me,
Speaker 1: what what made Kobe special is it wasn't even it
Speaker 1: wasn't about buying burger kings or buying Chick fil A's
Speaker 1: or whatever. It was about creating a business from nothing,
Speaker 1: making it into something and then like that is that
Speaker 1: ship is hard. And he was just like with the
Speaker 1: AU program, just like with the Lakers. He was an
Speaker 1: all in guy. He was the word I like to use.
Speaker 1: And I if you ever described me as indefatigable, which
Speaker 1: is not fatiguable, that's how you describe Kobe Bryant. That's
Speaker 1: how I want to be described. That's how you described
Speaker 1: Kobe Bryant. And again I can't vouch for him in
Speaker 1: all aspects of life. I can only tell you in
Speaker 1: my interactions the person that wasn't a Kobe guy, that
Speaker 1: not a shot guy. I understood that he had more
Speaker 1: value for longer because he got more juice out of
Speaker 1: the orange than Shack could ever get. Uh. I thought
Speaker 1: it was a pretty good dude, a really good dude.
Speaker 1: I consider him a friend. I'm super sad for everyone
Speaker 1: who lost somebody. My my daughter lost a best friend
Speaker 1: on that helicopter, and um, I know Rob Perlinkol lost
Speaker 1: a best friend. And I know that my friend Miles Simon,
Speaker 1: have you heard in this path he lost an absolute
Speaker 1: idol in Kobe Bryant who would become a friend as well. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I know there's lots of people who grew up
Speaker 1: watching basketball who are just crestfallen that you're not gonna
Speaker 1: chance to see Kobe Bryant courtside with Gianna and she
Speaker 1: was just gonna be a special player. Um, the only
Speaker 1: thing I can do is share the story with I'll
Speaker 1: share with you one more thing and then we'll wrap
Speaker 1: the pod. I asked him, I just like, what's the
Speaker 1: greatest thing you've ever done in basketball? And he goes,
Speaker 1: you know, people always said that I didn't make anybody better.
Speaker 1: That was the thing. I don't make guys better. And
Speaker 1: he's like how Derek Fisher do When he left, he
Speaker 1: started going through the different guys, you know, And did
Speaker 1: lamar Odom ever win? Was lamar Odom focused unless he
Speaker 1: played with us? And they said, you know, Pagasol, excuse
Speaker 1: my language of Pakastan. This is from Kobe Pallasol. People
Speaker 1: on in the NBA thought he was a pussy comes
Speaker 1: and plays the Lakers, he said. The people said, you
Speaker 1: can't win a championship, Pacasol, He's too oft. You know what,
Speaker 1: we won two championships with pall Gasol, So he's like,
Speaker 1: my the greatest thing is it's no different than Lebron.
Speaker 1: You want other to see other people succeed. Look at Lamar,
Speaker 1: look at Fish, you know, look at Palla Gasol and
Speaker 1: the success that they had as part of our championship runs.
Speaker 1: It's pretty amazing. It's a really good point. I'll share
Speaker 1: with you more thoughts of Kobe on our next pod.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, getting the gym. Getting the gym, overcome
Speaker 1: your own insecurity and love ball the way that Kobe
Speaker 1: love ball. I'm Doug Gottlieb. This is all ball.