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
I try to show my daughter that you have to compete at everything. You can't back down. I want my kids to understand that so when somebody puts an obstacle in front of you and says you can't do something, you don't back down. You push through that to get something accomplished. I tried to set that tone for her even at an early age. She's competitive already at the age of 3. Seriously.
I try not to think about it that much because I just try to stay in the moment as much as possible. That being said, I still appreciate greatly and feel very blessed and very fortunate with what's going on.
Shawn Marion is a great defender, but Lamar is a great player.
At the end of the season, here we are - playing our best basketball.
That?s Big Shot Rob, ... When the game?s on the line, he?s going to get us kick-started.
It took away from the nerves a little bit.
It was just a special moment. We're honored to be a part of it, really. This is truly a historical event and we felt like we came out here and gave them a good show.
They came out and they zoned up and they trapped and they doubled, and we just continued to move the ball. It took me three quarters to kind of get the rhythm down on what they were trying to do defensively so I could go into attack mode in the fourth quarter, where I was able to start attacking the basket a little bit and get something going.
They basically ran the ball down our throats in the first half, so we had to get adjusted to the tempo. In the second half, we were able to get a bead on them a little bit better.
They came out and played a lot harder than we did. After the last showing they had on their home floor, I think they took it upon themselves and played with more effort and more heart. And they did it.
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.
Once you open your eyes and start looking around you, you start picking up things that are very obvious.
You can't go and anticipate what it is that you want to see. You just have to be present. Be where you are.
The hunger [to success] is the same, no matter what it is that you're doing. It's like an unquenchable thirst to learn more, or to feel like you could have done more, and to be brutally honest and self critical, which is very hard to do. It's easy, and human nature is to just blame somebody else. It's very, very hard to self assess.