Kobe Bryant Discussion: Mamba Out!

Anyone know what he did to his left shoulder now?

 

You could tell Kobe wasn't playing around tonight. Wish he didn't shoot so much, but he wanted to beat the C Bags one more time. Great effort for a 37 year old on his last legs. Just six more games. A little over a week left in a historic, legendary career.

 

I hear that...and considering that I live in socal I would never have forgiven myself if I wasn't able to catch him play one last time this season

 

What was that cash prize being offered here again .... $100? For being at the game in person when Kobe scored the most points in his final season? May as well mail it to me now for the last MN game here. 38 baby .... plus the win ..... plus he shotted a good %.

 

Wow ..... Dream taking ALL the credit for Kobe's post game. Sometimes though you think you can see just a wee bit of MJ's moves in there too. Kinda anyway. But still great to read. :Headbang:

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/news/hakeem-olajuwon-says-kobe-bryant-073200613.html


Sports
Hakeem Olajuwon says Kobe Bryant was his greatest success as a coach
Sporting News 6 hours ago

Hakeem Olajuwon refuses to be a bystander as the NBA’s low post-scoring big men move toward extinction. Once the very best in the world at shimmying and scooping and driving from the post, the Rockets legend instead took up the task of teaching post moves to the next generation.

You can lead a big man to the block, but you can’t make him use it. So when Sporting News asked Olajuwon who has used his advice best, the answer was not Dwight Howard or Tyson Chandler or the Lopez twins. Not even LeBron James. Nope, it was one of his shortest pupils.


“I’ve worked with a lot of players, but the one who really capitalized on it the most is Kobe Bryant,” the Basketball Hall of Famer said of the 6-6 retiring Lakers legend. “When I watch him play, he'll go down in the post comfortably, naturally, and he'll execute it perfectly.”

Now employed by the Rockets, the team that he led to two championships in the 1990s, Olajuwon cannot work with the NBA pupils of his choosing — only Houston's guys now — but he still wants to see the game grow.




That’s why he joined the Allstate NABC Good Works Team, where he helped host a basketball clinic in Texas during the Final Four weekend. Olajuwon called the initiative, which is led by fellow former NBA All-Star Grant Hill, “rewarding” and was glad to honor college athletes who achieve on and off the court.

Olajuwon spoke with Sporting News on Sunday from Houston, host of the Final Four, the same stage where he made his name in runs to the 1983 and 1984 NCAA championship games at the University of Houston. What follows is an edited transcript of a conversation focused on the evolution in the NBA.

SN: How much do you think this tournament, a lot of these bad games, have been a product of the one-and-done era, of the next Hakeem Olajuwon only spending one year in college instead of three or four?

Olajuwon: Of course if you have guys leaving after one year, that means the quality goes down. Definitely. The development, when guys then take two years to develop in the NBA league, too. If you play sophomore and junior years, you become a more seasoned player. So that's definitely affected the quality of the tournament.

It's affecting the quality generally of players. They are going into the league not truly matured. They haven't played enough basketball to experience and get the confidence and level to adjust when they get to the big leagues.

SN: Moving to the NBA, particularly to your career a little bit. I'm looking back, and one of the great things about your career span was you got to measure yourself against so many great centers. Why do you think there are so few dominant big men, not just in the way the game is played but in terms of there just aren't as many great players at that size anymore?

Olajuwon: Every team's always looking for that diamond. The big man for any team is a diamond that everybody looks for. Even today, if you can find them anywhere on the globe, you bring them over. So it's always something that everybody looks for.

But the game has been impacted by fundamentals. The dominating big man, that role, has not been a focus to develop big men to be dominant forces. Why is it easy for a big man to dominate? Because it's easy to dominate from that position. Look at the offensive end: Pound it inside and have a go-to move, and you're going to force a double-team because no players want to guard you in the post one-on-one. So you're forcing a team to double- and triple-team, and that opens up opportunity for other people. You create opportunities for teammates on the other end.

At the same time, offensive rebounds, finishing — you have so much impact on offense. Then, on the defensive end, it's intimidation, the rebounding, the blocking shots, clogging the lane. There's so much with the way that position can impact the game. And that's not going away. It's just important that the player knows that role and has the ability to play that role for his team. Right now, small-ball is dominating. But nevertheless, you're still looking for that big man who can really have that impact to help you win.




SN: Your Rockets teams were the first teams ever to win the championship while leading the NBA in 3-pointers. There were a few teams before you, like Rick Pitino's Knicks, that shot a lot of 3s while being built around a center, but I'm wondering if you sort of see the court-spacing that everyone talks about with the Warriors, did that start with big men, the idea with having four guys who could shoot around the guy in the post?

Olajuwon: In our system, we knew that our strength was inside and that teams would try to guard me one-on-one. So it was our responsibility to force them to double-team. When they double-teamed, we had to spread the court with our shooters. So my job was to establish that inside game so that the outside guys could do their jobs: extend the court, make the 3-pointers.

But the problem was that if I didn't do my job and don't force them to double-team me, then my teammates all were affected. So the point was to make them pay by establishing that. So you have to have a single player with that ability to make the other teams pay. And there are some teams and coaches who will say, "Let him go one-on-one." We would change our game plan then to go inside, just to force them to double-team.

Golden State does it the other way. They don't have that inside, but they are a very balanced team. They have a lot of players, great shooters surrounding their big guys, who can get the second chances. They play together. They create shots, drive to the basket, kick it out to the open guy. So they're playing basketball more fun, all over the court and freelancing — but organized.


SN: Do you see any players in the NBA who remind you of yourself, given how differently the game is played?

Olajuwon: Well, I think Anthony Davis might be like me, with his size and ability to put it on the floor. But he's not as active in the post as the way he should be. I guess in time, he can use the post more. The way I see the game is, I wanted to be a complete player.

So as I'm playing against someone like Shaq (O'Neal) or Patrick (Ewing) or David (Robinson), I wanted to go outside and bring them out and cross them over. I didn't want them to play their own post game — that's their strength. But when you're smaller than me, I'll go inside. If you're bigger, I'll go inside.

To go outside, you have to be able to put it on the floor, you have to be able to shoot the jumper off the pick-and-roll. So what I see with Anthony Davis playing the position of center, this is the type of basketball I liked to play: free-flowing, open court, you can play small or you can post up. Just play basketball.

SN: Well, we all know you could definitely dribble and hang out there. So I'm wondering, if you were coming up in this era, would you be shooting 3s? Would you be taking those pick-and-pop jump shots that big men thrive on now?

Olajuwon: I wouldn't shoot 3s because, for me, 3s were a low-percentage shot. Now, when I was playing, they didn't want us to be taking jump shots because, if you took jump shots as a big man, they considered you soft. You should be in a paint. Inside the paint was for tough guys and big guys to mix it up. When you shoot jump shots, it's not physical. You were settling. That's the mentality. You can always settle. So for me to shoot 3s, I wouldn't be helping my team. I would rather be inside or even mid-range.

 

I'm glad that Kobe played well during my birthday!

 

Oldie, but goodie

 

The end is near. I can't believe it's next week already...

I'll be rockin' my gold 24 Lakers shirt all day next week.


Edit: LOL, that video is gold... Shaq of Neal's gift of a donkey LOL...

 

The last few seconds of the video...

"he sends inappropriate ravens"
"he's refusing to pass"
"just get the rebound"

 

Anyone else getting tired of hearing all this sympathy for Kobe? I get it. I wish he was going out on a better team, but he's part of the reason we suck so bad. He's just a tremendous liability on defense which is compounded by Hibbert's lack of mobility and having three very young players in the lineup who don't really know how to play defense consistently yet. Offensively he's shot us out of so many games and he just goes on this spurts where he refuses to pass the ball. Killing any continuity or rhythm within the offense. I love the guy, but I don't feel that bad for him. He's one of the biggest reasons we suck and he's got five rings. We and he should be thankful for that. Sucking the last 2-3 seasons and being a 5x world champion. It's sad to say, but we will be much better without him. Imagine how the young kids feel. Having an entire year wasted because of this sideshow retirement tour and constantly being resorted to just standing around and watching because it's all about Kobe. When he's gone they will be so much more actively involved on offense and we can play so much faster with him and Hibbert gone. Just by Kobe being gone and hopefully Lou as well our ball movement should improve provided we don't do the inexplicable and keep Byron around. Just annoys me seeing blind Kobe homers like Stephen A act like he can do no wrong. I love him as much as the next guy, but I hate how he's played this season. It didn't have to be this way. He could've still been celebrated, still had his moments of solid play, deferred to the young guys and let them make plays especially in crunch time and I would've had no issue.

 

Couldn't work in Byron
Or even Nick and Russell?
Talk about his D
Or his lack or hustle?

Still awesome

 

What you said.

 

Byron Scott’s Kobe Bryant ignorance knows no end
By Justin Terranova

April 6, 2016 | 11:18am



Byron Scott and Kobe Bryant Photo: Getty Images

Where was Byron Scott for the first 76 games of the season?

Kobe Bryant has five games left in his Hall of Fame-bound career after a 103-81 pasting by the Clippers on Tuesday night dropped their Los Angeles rivals to a worst-in-the-West 16-61. And the Lakers coach seems to have just parachuted into a season-long disaster in bemoaning how Bryant’s career will end on such a sour note.

“It bothers me that his last five, six, seven, eight games are going to be with the way we’re playing as a team,” Scott told reporters in Los Angeles. “That bothers me, because you’re talking about a champion. That bothers me, because he is a champion. And I hate to see him go out this way. Unfortunately this is the way it’s going to be.

“It bothers the hell out of me that somebody who’s given 20 years to this league and has played through broken fingers, come back from the Achilles, come back from the shoulder surgery, and he still goes out there and gives it everything he has, that bothers me.”

The Lakers have been an absolute train wreck since Game 1 this season, and Scott has appeared clueless about how to fix it.

Scott once again scapegoated the Lakers’ young talent, while ignoring the fact he has spent most of the season catering to Bryant’s retirement tour and stunting the growth of potential stars D’Angelo Russell and Julius Randle. Bryant, a shell of the unstoppable stud he once was, has averaged more than 28 minutes, putting up more than 16 shots per night at a career-worst 35 percent rate.

“I think I’ve said this before, it’s a shame that Metta [World Peace] and Kobe, guys up in age like that, they come out and play that hard,” Scott said. “And our young guys aren’t realizing that’s how they have to play as well to be successful in this league as well. I would love for our guys to play like Metta, because when he goes out there, he gives it everything he has on both ends of the floor, especially on the defensive end.”

The fact that Scott has failed to nurture that development in those players could be the main reason Bryant’s final game with the Lakers is likely to be Scott’s final one coaching the team.


http://nypost.com/2016/04/06/byron-scotts-kobe-bryant-ignorance-knows-no-end/