“You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” For many, even Chicago Bulls fans, Kobe Bryant did that and came back again.
“Kobe will never be MJ”. As a Chicago Bulls fan, those are some of the earliest strong sentiments I can remember having about Kobe Bryant; the kid born in Philly and raised in Italy that was drafted by the Charlotte Hornets in 1996 just to be flipped to the Los Angeles Lakers for Vlade Divac.
After all, he was just some (admittedly really talented) high schooler. How could he possibly be the next to challenge His Airness? Bryant sitting behind Eddie Jones to start his career made it a lot easier to hold firm to these beliefs. Doing so even as Kobe made the All-Star team in ’97 while coming off the bench was a challenge, but that’s fandom.
That’s the difference between Michael Jeffrey Jordan and Kobe Bean Bryant in my eyes.
One taught me all about how to be a fan. Cheering ceaselessly for my team, my city, to win. Knowing how important my support was for the guys going out there. Seeing Jordan’s Bulls dominate the NBA cemented a place for those beliefs that I still feel today.
But…Kobe. I wanted to hate him. I did hate him. Once he got his chance it was like watching MJ all over again. Only this version was more advanced. Maybe not athletically, thought that [rpbaly depends on who you ask. But certainly with the nuance and technicality of the game. Things that Jordan learned after taking lumps against the New York Knicks and Bad Boys Detroit Pistons.
Mike was always the fiercest competitor, on and off the court. But descriptions of how he spent his leisure time will rarely get a caption about there is no offseason. Kobe was, to put it simply, different.
He married his natural ability and will to win with an obsession for studying the game of basketball. An almost unnatural focus on being the best drives most top-level athletes. But the dedication to put so much work in showed the level of commitment Bryant had in reaching that goal and the respect he had for his peers to not rely solely on talent.
This is by no means meant to denigrate Jordan’s work ethic. It is in every way meant to highlight just how special Kobe’s was.
Fans often reminisce over where they were when Kobe dropped 81 on the Toronto Raptors. Hell, Jalen Rose had to further immortalize it with a commercial. But I don’t remember. I couldn’t tell you one detail about the situation or setting I was in. But I can tell you how I felt.
That’s because the game is all I remember. I was still a Jalen Rose fan from his time in Chicago and also wanted to see Chris Bosh. Kobe by now a 10-year vet and on his eighth All-Star appearance wasn’t my focus. But that wasn’t due to any ill-feeling towards him. It was because, by this point, we already knew what he could do. He couldn’t wow us any further, could he?
Narrator: He could, and did.
I remember watching, just three years before, as his sexual assault trial played out and thinking it was over for him. No athlete, no matter how big and regardless of whether you believed the charges or not, could come back from the charges levied.
Yet here was Bryant, surrounded by the likes of Smush Parker and Kwame Brown, giving the Raptors the absolute business in front of a feverish Staples Center crowd. This was redemption.
See redemption is not forgetting what wrongs a person may have done. That would better be described as foolishness. Instead, redemption is having your dirtiest of laundry being laid to bare in the public eye and being able to return to a place of adulation and admiration.
It should go without saying, but it probably still needs to be said: absolutely no one should forget the accusations levied against Bryant. There is a large swathe of people that will never be able to forgive or move past Colorado. That is their prerogative, forgiveness is for the forgiver, not the forgiven. And there are lessons to be gleaned no matter your feelings.
But the impact Byant had on the basketball and sports world is undeniable. “Mamba mentality” is more prevalent today than when he played. I still wasn’t a fan. But that journey from celebrated to scandal and back to celebrated is, for better or worse, “Mamba mentality”.
Then Kobe demanded a trade. The team he was linked to? My hometown Chicago Bulls.
This was it. This was the Bulls chance to return to glory. They were getting the best player in the NBA still in his prime and “he’s the closest thing to Mike”. Funny, right? With a headline about a rumor about a possibility, I was willing to overlook all the things I disliked about Bryant. His perceived arrogance, the media anointing him, even the rape case.
That’s when I realized my fandom changed. I realized how fickle the nature of being a fan really was. Aside from knowing it was short for ‘fanatic’, I never really gave it much thought. It was always as simple as rooting for the home team. But this made me change.
I realized how easy it was to separate the person from the public figure with the right motivation.
I could no longer just root for my team and its players. I clearly appreciated all players, even those I “hated” and what they brought to their sport. And I also had to be able to understand that those we admire (revere, whatever) most are just as fallible as the rest of us. Maybe even more so due to being “out of touch with the real world”.
When they go through situations that everyday Joes do, they don’t get the benefit of anonymity. Their celebrity brings with it the snap judgments of the courts of public opinion.
That’s an understanding I couldn’t grasp watching Jordan and the Bulls run roughshod over the NBA. As a 10-year-old during the Bulls final championship, Michael’s transgressions were over my head. I was aware, but I didn’t understand. It took me cheering for the “enemy” to get it.
https://twitter.com/kobebryant/status/1221276426164269056
Flash forward to 2013.
Kobe was working over the Golden State Warriors to the tune of 34 points while playing just under 45 minutes. He had been logging 40-plus minutes for several contests. Then, in the fourth quarter, Bryant tried to drive past Harrison Barnes when he went down in a heap. Bryant would *shake off a torn Achilles* to hit a pair of free throws to send the Lakers to the playoffs.
I have never cheered harder for any team I didn’t claim. Insert Deontay Wilder gif.
Kobe would go on to play two more seasons, making the All-Star team in both. And he fought through various injuries throughout his career. The man even scored 60 in his final game. But that was my eureka moment. Appreciating someone isn’t forgiving or forgetting their transgressions. It’s about the journey and where it wound up.
Many of life’s greatest lessons can be learned from sports. Kobe and his daughter Gianna Bryant’s tragic passing stirs up many emotions. None of them right or wrong. But for me, Kobe was the athlete that taught me how to appreciate the game of basketball. Thank you, Kobe, for that.