Kobe on making teammates better

This is how Gasol grew his balls, even though Gasol still does a great acting job....

My favorite quote was this

Rick doesn't even understand this....

 

Honestly, this is probably the first year I noticed that he's making his teammates better. And he has some great teammates that were already pretty good.

 

Jacking up tons of shots at 40% is a good way to make your teammates' offensive rebound stats look better, for sure!

 

Yes he's actually done a great job of this. I like his stance on the idiots who think making teammates better is about assists. But then you take away X player and the team sucks.

The Lakers playing great without Kobe truly is a testament at how much better he has made them.

Kobe turned a bunch of career losers and under-achievers into great players.

Think about it.

Pau Gasol was a useless 0-12 Playoffs before Kobe and now he's a 2 time Champion working on a 3rd one.

Lamar Odom has gone from a weed junkie to a candy junkie who has also become an elite defender

Ron Artest is still crazy but not crazy in a bad way.

Matt Barnes has bounced around how many teams?

Shannon Brown couldn't get any Playing time with Lebron.

 

I like that he starts by saying it has nothing to do with passing the ball or getting guys shots. Typical Kobe. :grin:

 

So he's saying that when his team is playing well without him, it's because of him and not because that is actually a very good team? Yeah, ok... sounds like a clever way to spin the fact that he isn't as valuable to his team as other players are to theirs.

 

The article is basically a puff piece for Kobe sycophants and casual NBA fans. When you consider the source-- #1 Lebron Hater Adrian Wojadouchkey-- it's hardly surprising that the article overhypes "intangibles" over actual numbers to make Kobe seem better than he is. Which is actually stupid, since Kobe has had a pretty damn good career on his own.

There are two good things in the piece: 1) Kobe finally publicly acknowledging that he was the sidekick during the threepeat, hopefully ending the "1/1A" propaganda put out by his fan patrol, and 2) Kobe pointing out that basketball isn't tennis and you need a good team to win (as if this wasn't self-evident, but many posters here don't seem to get it so it bears repeating). The rest is pretty much fluff that tries to make Kobe out to be some kind of Tony Robbins when everyone already knows that this is what Phil Jackson does, and does better than anyone else in history.

 

That's what the average fan thinks about when you think of "making teammates better".

Think of Gasol being called "Ga Soft" before he played with Kobe. 0-12 in the Playoffs and now a 2 time champion.

Kobe has made Gasoft into "The best player in the NBA" according to Kelly Dwyer.

Making your teammates better through "assists" is missing the point.

 

Hate him or love him, gotta respect his drive for the game.
Wish there were more guys with his drive.

 

Instead of making teammates better by getting assists "$tats". How about making them richer?

Smush Parker started with Cavs, cut after first year, because a journey man, played 2 yrs with Kobe averaged 10+ PPG, stole a 2yr/4M contract from Riley and cut in a few months.

Ariza was rotten on the bench in Orlando, got a 5yr/30M MLE from Rox.

Shannon Brown was drafted by Cavs, never had a chance to show what he can do. He's on the way to an MLE contract too.

Pau Gasol will not get a $65M extension over 3 years if he stayed in Grizzles, not would he deserve one.

Hughes averaged 22PPG, all defensive team before joining the Cavs, he's only 31 as of now and see what he's getting.

Shaq probably would get an MLE somewhere but he ended up with minimum after one year in Cavs.

Jamison was a 20/10 guy in Washington now his stock is all time low.

When you try to make comparison, there's no comparison.

 

Goodbug will only post in any Lebron or Kobe/Lakers related thread.
My advice to you, goodbug, please please spend more of your times in Lakers' forum.
Cause your debates are getting old. It always goes like this.
(1) Heat is Wade team not Lebron's
(2) Lebron gets his assists because he hogged the ball. Kobe will get double digits assists if he wanted too but his role is a scorer.
(3) Kobe makes his teammates better whereas Lebron don't.
(4) Kobe couldnt win anything without Shaq or Gasol because Smush, Kwame, and Walton sucked.

I thought you said the team leader (Kobe, Lebron, Jordan) was supposed to take all of the responsibility and blame, not blame it on his teammates, which is all you ever do when faced with the "kobe couldnt win without shaq or gasol" argument.

and your argument that Kobe is better than Jordan is always more or less the same.
Is fun to read your post at first but now is getting old. Please come back again if you have any new tricks. Thank you!

Signed,

everyone on clutchfans who isnt an idiot and thinks you are horrible at trolling

 

so you're saying kevin durant makes his teammates better? b/c they're 2-0 w/o him.

so you're saying steve nash doesn't make his teammates better b/c they suck without him? and yet the whole world says nash makes everybody better. yet when he's not on the floor, his team goes into suck mode. so are we saying kobe and kevin durant make their teammates better than steve nash? HELL NO

hell, we can go into other sports. you take manning out of the colts and they would stink offensively. does that mean he doesn't "lift" the winning culture of the colts? LOL. that's a bunch of BS.

the reason certain teams (lakers, spurs, thunder, magic) can play without their star is b/c their team is DEEP. they can afford to go without their main guy for a stretch.

lakers have gasol, artest, odom.
spurs have manu, parker
thunder have westbrook and green
magic have vince, jameer, and lewis.

but for certain other teams, the star is everything to that team and is asked to do a lot more b/c those teams aren't as deep

what do you think he will say? i mean, he shot 25% in game 7 of the finals and he made his teammates better. c'mon now

 

I am merely saying if a star truly makes teammates better, they'll get better paid from NBA GMs around the league, as better players deserve better pay. Exactly the case for Smush, Ariza, Gasol, Brown, and the exact opposite for Hughes. That's the objective way to look at it.

 

Lol Kobe's (probably unconsciously) taking alot of shots at LeBron here...hilarious. You gotta respect the man's dedication though...Alot of him we see may be fake..but not when it comes to basketball. From him being able to beat LBJ in one on one to this...you can just tell there is no hint of doubt in his words...

mad respect.

 

Well at the other extreme (but just as emphatic about his views) is a certain Al ...something. Personally I think people with strong views make the board much more intresting.

 

In case you don't know, Clippy only came up with this statement when he's shut up by facts. You can't argue with facts, but you can always attack a poster.

 

Yeah, you can add Caron Butler to that list too. He used to compete with Rasual Butler in Miami before playing with Kobe. Now he's getting paid.

All these under-achievers got a whole lot better playing with Kobe.

Take Kobe and put him on the Rockets with Scola, Battier, Aaron Brooks and the Rockets would whup Memphis Pau Gasoft, Miami Lamar "Weed" Odom and Sacramento "Crazy Pills" Ron Artest.

 

Are you kidding me, everyone talks about how lebron had such a sucky team so he had to carry the burden and if he had 8 assists a game with bad teammates think how good he can do with good teammates, now he has 2 other arguably top 10 players, his turnovers are up, hes more inefficient, has worse stats overall, this doesn't mean hes a worse player, its just hat he was force fed those stats, and statistics themselves are a product of useage rate and offensive system more so than everything, so people trying to compare lebron's stats in cleveland's drive and kick offense with him as the centerpiece and lakers triangle offense are comparing apples and oranges.

 

I agree that the Heat are underperforming, and if Lebron doesn't win multiple titles with this squad, he's failed... he really has no excuses as far as talent goes. But statistics aren't meaningless (for instance, Lebron still is putting up better numbers than Kobe this year, even though his overall numbers are down). They have to be taken in context.

The fact is that Kobe is a low-percentage volume shooter and that has been a constant in his career independent of his teammates (he even shot an abysmal 46% with the best teammates ever against crappy competition in the Olympics, while taking the most shots on the team, come on). To ignore this and write off his success to "intangibles" (eg, making teammates better) is an insult to any rational basketball fan's intelligence. Kobe is a winner because 1) he does a lot of things well, 2) he's always had great teammates, 3) he has the best coach in the league and 4) he plays for the best franchise in the league (one that isn't afraid to spend, attracts the top free agents, and gets superstar players in trades for nothing). But no one would want to write that article because it's too honest.