Larry Brown's coaching in 2004 and the inexperience of 2006 have been overlooked, and we’ve been drawn into calling the best team in the Olympic field the Redeem Team.
13 Draft Picks, Locating The Foundation Of The Celtics Dynasty
Everything being equal, teams that luck into the first pick in the draft when a superstar is on the horizon are going to be teams that contend for and win NBA titles. But how does that explain the Celtics?
Not even a year ago, Kobe demanded to be traded, reminding fans more of the 19 year-old punk who waved off a Karl Malone screen at an All-Star game, than a 28 year-old man entrusted with carrying a legendary franchise on his back. Those comments, and subsequent ones by owner Jerry Buss willing to “listen” to trade requests for Kobe created a media frenzy around Lakers training camp, which harked back to the Kobe-Shaq feud days in the championship years.
In an odd way, all the controversy was almost business as usual for Bryant, who seems to thrive under intense controversy. He probably just does it to keep his name in the papers in LA, where he has to compete with the Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise and David Beckham’s of the city for attention.
As this season began it was unclear how many days Kobe would stay with the team. Phil Jackson’s analysis of Kobe from his 2004 book, The Last Season: A Team in Anguish, seemed to be more spot on than ever:
His ability to take over a game, to make an impossible play, is unmatched. Yet … Kobe is missing out by not finding a way to become part of a system that involves giving to something larger than himself. He could have been the heir apparent to MJ and maybe won as many championships. He may still win a championship or two, but the boyish hero image has been replaced by that of a callous gun for hire.
And then suddenly, as is only possible in the world of sports where heroes, goats, protagonists and villains change nightly, by early January, the Lakers were one of the best teams in the NBA.
Kobe continued to turn the tables on everyone, with the most poignant one sentence of his career, “We're a championship-caliber team with him in the lineup.”
Following a period at the NBA’s pinnacle, which just was not good enough for him because of his role as “sidekick,” Kobe was all of a sudden mature in the wake of a teammate’s injury. He was willing to acknowledge that the team’s ultimate success, was impossible for him to achieve alone.
That the teammate was Andrew Bynum, a high school phenom growing into a supporting role next to an established, brash, immature and impeccably talented superstar, an exact juxtaposition of Kobe’s role at the end of the last decade next to Shaq, gives the statement even more weight.
Ever since Kobe came into the league, his sights have been set on being the best ever. That was why he waved off Malone in the ’98 All-Star game. He wanted to not only take on, but beat the best non-center of all-time, Michael Jordan, all by himself. It has been this attitude and confidence that has carried Kobe to the top of his profession.
Along the way, Bryant has put up undeniable individual numbers: he’s made nine straight all-star teams, won two scoring titles and has even scored more points than Jordan did by the age of 28.
Ironically, though, his inability to trust others is also what has kept him from reaching his ultimate goal. His selfishness and inability to trust his teammates broke up the first Lakers dynasty before its time and has led his team’s since to not live up to (their albeit limited) potential.
For as Kobe knows all too well, if he wants to even be considered as the best ever, there is only one number that matters: six. Six NBA championships for his Airness that is.
NBA Titles are ultimately the biggest separator amongst the all-time greats. It is why, despite possibly being THE most talented center ever, Wilt Chamberlin will never be an OG like Kareem Abdul-Jabar or Bill Russell. Two championships are nice Wilt, but they’re amateur hour compared to the 6 and 11 of Kareem and Russell.
This is not to say Kobe has not already had a hall of fame career, he has. His three NBA titles and years dominating the competition put him in a rare class of players. But, as anybody watching him knows, that is so far from enough for him, that he may as well have never won any.
Especially considering he only won them starring as Tim Drake.
As a quick side note, before moving on with Kobe, let me make one thing clear: If there is anyone in the NBA who has even the slightest chance of eclipsing MJ as the greatest non-big man of all time (I would put Kobe’s chances at .1%) it is Mr. Bryant, NOT LeBron James. LeBron is 23 already and all he has to show for it is one pitiful performance in the NBA Finals following the easiest journey there in NBA history. Kobe already had two titles and was on his way to his third by then.
Granted Kobe Had Shaq, but he was also a much more complete player than Lebron at the same age. Both made multiple All-NBA teams, but Kobe also made the the All-NBA 1st Defensive team by 21, something LBJ has not come close too. Furthermore, many people say LeBron is better than Kobe because he “gets his teammates involved.” This is overly simplistic, as Kobe made Shaq better every year they played together.
Their coach acknowledge as much in a conversation with Kobe:
“‘I got Shaq the most valuable player award last night [in the All-Star game],’ Kobe said ‘I know how to make Shaq the best player on the floor.’ No doubt he was right. Nobody, when he is committed, can deliver the ball to Shaq more consistently, in a better spot, than Kobe.”
LeBron can’t even get a teammate to the All-Star game, much less win him the game’s MVP, and he plays in the East.
OK, that wasn’t so quick, but back to Kobe, he seems to have FINALLY figured out a way to work with his teammates enough to let them make him and his team better. It could be a matter of this being the first time since Shaq’s left that Kobe has any teammates he respects, but is it the chicken or the egg? It does not matter.
What matters is that he for really the first time in his career trusts his team. As consultant, and longtime Jackson assistant Tex Winter put it, “Kobe loves to play basketball, and once the season got under way and he got on the court playing, he recognized that some of these youngsters are better than he anticipated they would be, especially [Andrew Bynum].”
All of this is excellent progress, but at the end of the day what matters is not how Kobe and his teammates get along on the soap opera known as the Lakers franchise, but if they win. And even if Bynum were not out for eight weeks, is this team good enough to take the West?
With Bynum at full strength, I really do have to agree with Kobe on this one, the team is championship caliber. Kobe and Bynum form a good enough one-two punch, and while Odom clearly cannot handle much responsibility, his all-around game is ideally suited for the triangle and he is light years better than any 3rd banana Shaq and Kobe ever had when they won.
Even if Odom got high before every game, I’d still take him over Glen Rice or Rick Fox.
I feel that trio could beat a Parker-Ginobli-Duncan or Nash-Stoudemire-Marion in a really good series. And they could definitely destroy a Garnett-Allen-Pierce led squad. If it got to that point, Phil Jackson would just embarrass Doc Rivers over seven games. I’m not going to mention the Mavs, because they lost to the Warrriors last year, or the Hornets, because they are still far too young.
Beyond their top three, I see Derek Fisher filling sort of a Bill Cartwright on the original Bulls championship teams sage veteran role. Fisher is the consummate professional who will sacrifice everything for his team, and he has made more shots in big games than just about any superstar you can think of.
People also forget, he was drafted the same year as Kobe and has played with Bryant far more than any other teammate. I think his positive influence on Black Mamba will be one of the most underrated elements to this season.
Aside from Fish, in another ironic twist, given Bynum’s injury, the Lakers’ championship aspirations and Kobe’s quest for absolute immortality rest on one of the greatest failures of the man he’s trying to surpass, Kwame Brown. Also known as the absolutely horrendous first overall pick by MJ when he was GM for the Wizards. Brown needs to step up big over the next two months, because getting one of the top 4 seeds and home court in the first round is of paramount importance for this group.
All in the pieces are in place for Bryant to take a shot he may not really deserve to surpass Michael. At age 29, Kobe has three titles. Jordan won his third at 29. Kobe does have another thing going for him, in that given Jordan’s baseball sabbatical, he missed two years in his prime, and only won three more following his comeback and second retirement at age 34. If (a huge if) Kobe plays at this all-world level to 34, that gives him six more years, including this one, to win rings.
Just to clarify exactly how daunting the path which lies before Kobe is, I will defect again to their mutual coach, Phil Jackson. This time I will quote from a book about MJ’s supposed “last season” 1997-’98. The year the two squared for the first time under the national spotlight at that All-Star game. The book, Playing for Keeps, is by the immortal, late, great David Halberstam, and the quote comes from a conversation between Phil and MJ over MJ’s first decision to retire following the 3rd championship,
“Jackson shrewdly answered he would not try to change his mind … But he reminded Jordan … His talent, Jackson said, was not merely that of a great athlete but transcended athleticism to become an art form. His gift was along the lines of a Michelangelo, Jackson said, and therefore Jordan at the least had to understand that it belonged not just to the artist but to the millions who stood in awe of the art itself and derived, in a life otherwise filled with the mundane, such pleasure from what he did. 'Michael,' he added, 'pure genius is something very, very rare and if you are blessed enough to possess it, you want to think a long time before you walk away from using it.”
Looking back to my initial quote from Jackson about Bryant, clearly he feels Kobe has a little ways to go before getting to that best ever level.
That said, here is another quote from that same back about the ’03 – ’04 Lakers. Recalling his exit meeting with Bryant following the Lakers loss in the Finals and Jackson’s upcoming retirement announcement,
“Kobe and I did work well together-for four months, that is. This time the same tension between us wasn't there. We both knew I would never coach him again.”
No matter what anybody wants to say one way or another, as of today, Mr. Bryant, you still have a chance to reach your goals. The Bat Signal is on. What happens from here is up to you.
