Kobe Bryant
Kobe Bryant
Kobe Bean Bryantis an American retired professional basketball player. He played his entire 20-year career with the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association. He entered the NBA directly from high school and won five NBA championships with the Lakers. Bryant is an 18-time All-Star, 15-time member of the All-NBA Team, and 12-time member of the All-Defensive team. He led the NBA in scoring during two seasons, and ranks third on both the league's all-time regular season scoring and...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBasketball Player
Date of Birth23 August 1978
CityPhiladelphia, PA
CountryUnited States of America
People that know me understand that's just me. That's not something that was fabricated. The people who don't side with you or agree with you, you use that as fuel. You use that as motivation.
That was a great class. A lot of great players came out of that draft. I don't think people are fully aware of the talent that came out of that draft.
It makes me very proud of him. I look at all these guys here like little brothers. And he is out there in practice and working hard. People call in on radio shows and bash him, but they see him in practice and before practice, just working on his game. His improvement tonight just didn't come out of nowhere.
It's great. It's bigger than the sport because we're looked up to by so many young people out there. It's great.
This being our home court, people come here and think it's Hollywood and all sorts of stuff, so they think they'll come down (the lane) and look pretty and shoot jump shots and dunk the ball and finger-roll the ball and do all sorts of cute stuff. And we've got to stop that.
He's been doing the defensive part all year long. Sometimes, the people want more. Tonight he gave them more.
What I saw today was a collection of people who have obviously been through a devastating time but are not down. Their spirits are not down. It's a bounce-back kind of attitude and energy that I got from them. ... Their energy is just tremendous.
I really don't give it that much thought. A lot of people talk about it, and they saw how difficult it is to do. I just go out there and I work hard.
I just want to be recognized as a great player. That's what we all want. It's about getting the W's (wins) and nothing else. I can't let what people think or say about me bother me.
And now the shoe's on the other foot. When I was going through it, I wanted people to be patient with me. I'm just reciprocating.
People look at my competitive spirit, and they automatically attach it to the thing that's most similar, most easily recognizable, which is Michael [Jordan's] competitive spirit. I'm different. I enjoy building. I enjoy the process of putting the puzzle together, and then the byproduct of that, the consequence of that, is beating somebody. That becomes the cherry on top, the icing on the cake.
I'm not the most patient of people.
People just don't understand how obsessed I am with winning.
The people who truly know me know what I'm like. There have been people who try to say things that aren't fair, and I check them. And then they don't like me because I checked them.