Kobe Discussion: shark swimming / #prayforthesharks (664)

CaCHooKa Man wrote:

"There's a reason why he's the best player in the game," Horford said of Bryant. "He did what he usually does, and we didn't do a good enough job on him. It's disappointing. We thought we worked hard and put ourselves in a position to win. We just had too many mistakes down the stretch."

Kobe8Fan wrote:

Murdock wrote:The problem i see with Kobe and the reason you see two distinctive modes is tha Kobe can't play well balanced game ... it's either Kobe-shooting mode or Kobe-passing mode nothing in between ... sometimes you see him shoot over 3 people instead of making right basketball play and pass ... and sometimes you see him over passing instead of making right basketball play by shooting the ball ...

and this indirectly leads to off the ball player movement ... JVG commented it best in one game - it's all about making right basketball play at the right time ... and Kobe hasn't been doing that in the past 3 years IMO

I'd say Kobe has been doing that for 16 years. Probably a little more worse since '05 as being the man on the team. The past several games, he finally knows how to balance between scoring and moving the ball.

puffyusaf#2 wrote:I am surprised to see you post. That being said, how do you say he isn't playing a balanced game? Isn't his stats 27/6/6 or something like that? He sat for 8 minutes in the second quarter and we fed Dwight over and over and over again and he missed, missed, missed, missed some more. Our aggressiveness failed us. Kobe comes back in and we right the ship and all of a sudden we extend our lead from 4 to 7 by half time. Even the greatest to ever touch a basketball (The King) makes bad plays or the wrong choice yet only Kobe gets criticized for not having balance. That doesn't make much sense to me.

It was clear about halfway through the third quarter Sunday night against Atlanta Kobe Bryant was either going to win or lose the game for the Lakers.
Watching him in the context of this season, playing very well with his team still not in the Western Conference’s top eight, is fascinating. His intensity is off the charts. Not just on the dunk he threw down over Josh Smith with just over two minutes remaining in the fourth quarter that nearly broke Twitter and prompted what was without question the most raucous response seen at Staples Center this season (for a Lakers game, at least). After hitting a deep triple to close out the third quarter, the guy slapped himself so hard across the chest, spit and drool were flying out of his mouth like some sort of wild dog.
Watch. It’s almost hypnotic, the string of saliva swaying back and forth.
And there was this. And this. Both via the Twitter feed of ESPNLA’s Beto Duran… after the game.
He certainly didn’t expect to be in this position, with the Lakers on the outside looking in, but he’ll get them into the postseason or die trying. And so the narrative following Sunday’s narrow and critical and fortunate 99-98 win is rightly all about Bryant. His dunk was spectacular, but the shot he made two minutes later putting the Lakers up one was more impressive. Game on the line, Bryant drove around Al Horford off the right wing, then absorbed contact from Smith — a decent leaper, I hear — and finished off the glass.
“That,” Mike D’Antoni said after with a hint of understatement, “is not easy. That’s why he gets the big bucks.”
The highlights posted by Kobe down the stretch were electric, reflecting the sort of iron will for which he’s famous. But the narrative of Bryant’s turn-back-the-clock night on what has in many ways been a turn-back-the-clock season would have been much different had that last shot over Smith rimmed out. It may have come with a heap of spectacular (the dunk, the 3-pointer capping the third quarter, etc.) but before the game winner, Bryant was 6-15 in the second half and had basically turned things into a mano-y-mano affair between himself and the five manos in Atlanta uniforms. Had that last shot not fallen, people would still be talking about the dunk, but they’d also note how Kobe took every shot but one over the final four minutes and generally monopolized the rock down the stretch on a night where Steve Nash was having enormous success working his way through the Atlanta defense.
The point here isn’t to call Bryant a ball hog, or suggest he’s putting personal glory above team success. Speaking of narratives, those are lazy ones that ought to die. Everything Bryant does, from the way he pokes teammates to the “Magic Kobe” transformation, is motivated by winning games. Sometimes the path he chooses to get there isn’t ideal, but we know this already. Sunday’s effort was everything people love and hate about Bryant, with all the angst and joy on nearly every trip down the floor, and he absolutely, positively came out on top.
In incredible form, no less.
Instead, what struck me was the incredibly narrow margin separating stories vastly totally different in focus and tone. If that last shot over Smith doesn’t drop, the conversation about Bryant is completely different Monday morning. The dunk is still huge, but comes with a boatload of “Yeah, but…”. Sports radio spends the day questioning chemistry and counting field goal attempts. If Smith doesn’t fumble the ball on Atlanta’s final possession, the Lakers go from gritty victors to choke artists who blew a 16-point third quarter lead, severely denting their postseason hopes in the process.
All over one point in a game featuring nearly 200 of them. This is the line the Lakers and Bryant (and certainly Dwight Howard) are currently walking, and it’s still not clear on which side they’ll land, insofar as the playoff chase is concerned, at least. I
Kind of appropriate for a night where the Lakers finally get back to .500.

Murdock wrote:

puffyusaf#2 wrote:I am surprised to see you post. That being said, how do you say he isn't playing a balanced game? Isn't his stats 27/6/6 or something like that? He sat for 8 minutes in the second quarter and we fed Dwight over and over and over again and he missed, missed, missed, missed some more. Our aggressiveness failed us. Kobe comes back in and we right the ship and all of a sudden we extend our lead from 4 to 7 by half time. Even the greatest to ever touch a basketball (The King) makes bad plays or the wrong choice yet only Kobe gets criticized for not having balance. That doesn't make much sense to me.

balanced game isn't about stats or number of points vs number of assists ... as I mentioned it's about making right basketball play at the right time which Kobe has never been too known for (triangle compensated for that IMO) ...

the thing about balance is it is achieven over long period of time and what have we seen in this season? Kobe mode - Passer mode - and Kobe mode again as of now ... what you can see in LeBron is playing balanced game throughout the year ...

and if you watch Kobe playing its a scoring mentality from the start or passing mentality from the start ... but you never see the middle IMO and he says so himself ... which in the end results for him making bad basketball-wise plays no matter the result ... for example if Kobe shoots over 3 people and makes instead of passing ball to a wide open player (I am not saying it happened in recent time but in the past and this is just an example of what I am trying to say so don't take it as s hate) ... what is the right basketball play? - to pass right? (if you disagree then this is debate is over) however Kobe more times than not would decide to shoot ... and THAT is a balanaced game ... making right basketball plays during a game - this however doesn't have to appear in the stat sheet since it can be a hockey pass in the end or a missed shot but still it is a right basketball play ...

that is why IMO people and myself included prefer over-passing (Kobe-passing mode) over Kobe-mamba mode (or whatever you wanna call it)

kenzo wrote:[img]http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8530/8526183709_ffb6f11511_o.gif[img]

therealdeal wrote::man10:

Aaaaaaaaaand Kobe shoots too much is back.