Uploaded January 2023 | Updated September 2026, 16 hours ago
Kobe Bryant opens up about the Michael Jordan comparisons during an interview from 1999. Kobe says, “the only reason people make comparisons is just so they can relate themselves better with the new player coming up.”
Full interview from Somewhat Aussie: youtu.be/r9w4VGoz3QM
Excerpt from ‘Book Excerpt: The night 13-year-old Kobe Bryant met Michael Jordan, and his future’ article by Mike Sielski:
Both on the court and off it, Kobe Bryant was a thirteen-year-old version of the twenty-three-year-old version of Michael Jordan, believing that he could do it all alone, that he was his team’s only hope and salvation, that passing was inherently unproductive, every shot he took acting as a salve for his own ego. Jordan did not win his first NBA championship until his seventh year in the league, until June 1991, before Kobe had entered eighth grade. The Jordan who would go on to win six NBA titles, who learned to trust John Paxson in the final minute of one championship-clinching victory and Steve Kerr in another, who gave in to Phil Jackson and Tex Winter and the selfless cohesion inherent in the triangle offense and saw his game flourish for it, had just emerged, just broken through his chrysalis.
So why not allow Kobe to see, up close, this fuller iteration of Jordan? His father, Joe, as a former NBA player, could make that meeting happen. Joe could get Kobe into the Spectrum when the Chicago Bulls came to Philadelphia to play the Sixers.
And he did. Before the teams’ game on March 8, 1992, father led son into the arena’s locker room, and Kobe said hello to Michael Jordan. Jordan said hello back and gave him a wristband. There is no lasting indication that Kobe was nervous or stuttering or in any regard intimidated by Jordan. That was merely the entirety of their conversation; Jordan had nothing else to say. Neither did Kobe, who introduced himself to Bulls forward Horace Grant.
Full article: latimes.com/sports/lakers/story/2022-02-20/book-excerpt-the-night-13-year-old-kobe-bryant-met-michael-jordan-and-his-future
🏷 #mj #kobe #beasts #legends #goats #michaeljordan #kobebryant #jumpman #mamba
Kobe Bryant opens up about the Michael Jordan comparisons during an interview from 1999. Kobe says, “the only reason people make comparisons is just so they can relate themselves better with the new player coming up.”
Full interview from Somewhat Aussie: youtu.be/r9w4VGoz3QM
Excerpt from ‘Book Excerpt: The night 13-year-old Kobe Bryant met Michael Jordan, and his future’ article by Mike Sielski:
Both on the court and off it, Kobe Bryant was a thirteen-year-old version of the twenty-three-year-old version of Michael Jordan, believing that he could do it all alone, that he was his team’s only hope and salvation, that passing was inherently unproductive, every shot he took acting as a salve for his own ego. Jordan did not win his first NBA championship until his seventh year in the league, until June 1991, before Kobe had entered eighth grade. The Jordan who would go on to win six NBA titles, who learned to trust John Paxson in the final minute of one championship-clinching victory and Steve Kerr in another, who gave in to Phil Jackson and Tex Winter and the selfless cohesion inherent in the triangle offense and saw his game flourish for it, had just emerged, just broken through his chrysalis.
So why not allow Kobe to see, up close, this fuller iteration of Jordan? His father, Joe, as a former NBA player, could make that meeting happen. Joe could get Kobe into the Spectrum when the Chicago Bulls came to Philadelphia to play the Sixers.
And he did. Before the teams’ game on March 8, 1992, father led son into the arena’s locker room, and Kobe said hello to Michael Jordan. Jordan said hello back and gave him a wristband. There is no lasting indication that Kobe was nervous or stuttering or in any regard intimidated by Jordan. That was merely the entirety of their conversation; Jordan had nothing else to say. Neither did Kobe, who introduced himself to Bulls forward Horace Grant.
Full article: latimes.com/sports/lakers/story/2022-02-20/book-excerpt-the-night-13-year-old-kobe-bryant-met-michael-jordan-and-his-future
🏷 #mj #kobe #beasts #legends #goats #michaeljordan #kobebryant #jumpman #mamba
