How many field goals will Kobe take in his final game? (Reps for whoever guess right)

When Nash retired he said he was capable of playing at a high level once or twice a week, but he couldn't do it for a full season anymore.

 

But you should recognize greatness, Kobe last night helped push the all time missed shot record even farther away from everyone that has ever played the game. No one will ever miss more shots than Kobe Bryant. Hell, no one is within 1000 missed shots of Kobe. He is the greatest bricklayer in combined NBA/ABA history.

The closest active player to Kobe is Dirk, and he'd have to miss almost 3000 more shots to top Kobe.

Even well known chucker Melo would have to play till he was 50 to miss that many shots.

 

Yeah, kinda how I feel. I was highly entertained but didn't find the feat that impressive. It was bad basketball. All-Star game is a proper comparison. A dude with a 63% usage, lol.

50 shots, cmon man.

 

Kobe Bryant, Number One Bum:

Kobe Bryant
John Havlicek
Elvin Hayes
Karl Malone
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Michael Jordan
Dominique Wilkins
Rick Barry
Julius Erving
Dirk Nowitzki
Elgin Baylor
Allen Iverson
Vince Carter
Wilt Chamberlain
Paul Pierce
Kevin Garnett
Dan Issel
Moses Malone
Ray Allen
Alex English

 

Fixed it for you

 

Let's be real here, guys. if he passed off on half the three's he missed he would've had an outstanding 60pt game with a great shooting percentage. 6-21 from 3 is awful. Cut it to 6-14 and thats 22-43 shooting. He played so much so he was continuously chucking from the outside cause he physically could not get to the hole every possession.

 

Kobe on the Spurs would be awesome, they could get production out of him.

 

Seriously. Os Trig also clarified Harden did NOT beg for Kobe to beat the Jazz which Kobe single handily DID. Who is this mystery person??

 

Hard to have turnovers if you shoot every time you touch the ball.

 

is it? i mean harden is one of the league leaders in shot attempts

 

C'mon. I've been a Harden critic. But be real. Kobe had 4 assists and 50 FGA last night. Harden average 7.5 assists and 20 FGA. The more you pass, the more likely to have TOs.

 

just wanted to throw that out there haha i get what you were saying. but last nights game was what it was. just disappointing seeing people be so critical that they have to dissect it.

 

Noice

 

harden dribbles and dribbles and dribbles and shoots way more.

Kobe is the ultimate Chucking guard..... nobody is going to surpass that in a long time

 

I don't know how anyone can hate on last nights performance by Kobe. I know many of you go to your computers and google all sorts of stats that justify that Kobe was some average player or something, but the truth is, if you are a fan of actually watching basketball, it is pretty obvious that Kobe has held the mantle as the most important player to the NBA ever since MJ left. What you guys are missing is that when people go to the games...especially NBA which is among the least strategic sport of all the major sports...people want to see something amazing and incredible. As valuable a player that Tim Duncan has been in the same span, the truth is there is nothing ultra exciting about his game. He is in a good system that gets him the ball in good spots so he can make his turnaround hook that he has lived off of.

If you just do the sniff test, the NBA was revived in the 80's behind the rivalry of Magic and Bird...they passed the mantle to Michael Jordan who turned the NBA into a marketing machine...and then to Kobe who took the NBA global. You can argue that Lebron has sort of had the mantle the last 3 or 4 years, but there's something about Lebron that reeks of bully. I just don't feel what he has done in his career screams inspirational and he may end up finishing his career with just 2 rings which, with his physical gifts, reeks of underachiever. Yes, it is a team sport, but Lebron has been on plenty of teams with enough talent that he should have been able to carry them to more championships. Steph Curry is going to carry the NBA mantle after Kobe and it's not because of any analytics or efficiency or whatever. It's the fact that, when you go to the game to see him play, he could put on a shooting exhibition that completely siezes the audiences attention. Take your precious James Harden who for the most part scores just as many points as Curry. He may even have a higher TS% because of the amount of free throws he flops out. On paper, maybe that's more efficient and that's how they should play, but it's not exciting. I don't think watching Harden flail his arms over and over so he can get 15 FTs as exciting basketball. So as efficient as he appears on paper...minus all the turnovers, it's not inspiring and the ball don't lie. Plus, they should count field goal attempts when you take a shot while getting fouled but that sort of scews the TS% stat to favor a guy like Harden over Curry. Curry consistently has a higher FG%, 3Pt% and FT% yet people on this board parade around the TS% which I think should be called the Flop%.

Getting back to Kobe's 60 points last night...you can poo poo the meaninglessness of the game and say that the Jazz weren't trying, but they still had their starters in the game and had a 15 points lead before Kobe outscored their entire team in the 4th quarter 23-21. Just like his 81 point game that I actually consider the most underrated moment in modern basketball...the Lakers were actually down 18 points in the first half when Phil Jackson begrudgingly told Kobe to take the game over. He scored those 81 points leading the Lakers back in the game and actually winning the game by 18. The truth is, the Lakers won the game last night so who cares if he took 50 shots. People were paying an average of $2000 per ticket to see Kobe's last game so why wouldn't he take as many shots as his body would allow. He actually missed his first 5 shots so if you took those out, he went 22-45 which is close to 50% from the field. 22-50 is 44% which is not actually a bad FG% so I don't see what the issue is.

 

And speaking of players who have scored 60 or more points in a game...the only active players that have done it are Melo and Lebron and they've only done it once each. Kobe has done it 6 times and over 80 points once. If you're looking at efficiency and calling him an overrated player because he takes so many shots, you are missing the point. A player who can come into your arena and drop 60+ points or 80+ points is something that will not come around too often and, when you go back to NBA classic and watch some of those games, you almost don't believe what he's doing. And he's not doing it while his team is losing. Kobe has 5 championship rings with many improbable finishes where I could swear the Lakers were done but he carried them back. Shaq challenged Kobe to score 50 last night and Kobe scored 60 (at the age of 37). And that is why he draws people in and that is why he's the player of his generation.

 

If you like chucking, Kobe was your man. If you like good basketball, Kobe was barely a blip on the radar. There was MJ, then there was Shaq and Duncan, then there was Lebron and Durant.

Kobe's legacy is that of a selfish chucker that ran out any talent that his team managed to get. The guy that killed the Lakers.

They brought in Shaq to win championships for them, Kobe ran him out of town.

They brought in Pau to win championships for them, Kobe ran him out of town.

In the end, he was by himself chucking against the Washington Generals and celebrating 60 points on 50 shots and 12 FT's in one of the worst seasons in Lakers history....good job kiddo.

 

Added some unbiased details in for you.

 

That spin doesn't really make it any better though. I mean, credit where it's due, Kobe is for sure somewhere in the top 50 all time players, but he's one of the worst teammates ever at the same time.

I mean, he's top 50 as a player, probably top 5 as a bad teammate. and for sure the top dog as an awful chucker.

 

Well, for most of Kobe's prime, he captivated the attention of the NBA audience because of his slashing and dunking. I'd say, in the years between 2000 and 2003, he had a more complete combination of dunking and chucking than MJ himself in any year he played.

Are you kidding me????

Yeah, I mentioned Duncan and Lebron already. Durant is actually you're prototypical chucker along with Steph Curry...but that seems to be the direction of the NBA so what the hell are you talking about???

Shaq had it all in Orlando including a superstar slasher SG in Penny Hardaway but his lack of focus and inability to close in the 4th quarter was not going to lead to any championships. He had all-star Eddie Jones at SG when he got to the Lakers and they went nowhere for 3 years before Kobe was finally ready to take the post-season for the Lake Show. Between him fouling out vs the Blazers in a key post-season matchup in 2000 as well as vs the Pacers along with his limitation with Hack and Shaq being the known strategy, it was up to Kobe to come up with those rings. Even though Shaq scored the most points which appears to be the criteria for MVP these days. Truth is that Shaq ran himself out of town when he pointed at Jerry Buss during a pre-season game and said "Pay Me!!!" That didn't sit well and the Buss family moved quickly to trade him 2 years early vs 1 year too late.

Really??? Pau was not a leader and was really a very talented follower who gave Kobe what he needed to get 2 more rings. The Lakers were actually a pretty average team with 2 all stars carrying the way those years. But if you think Kobe is some random "chucker" who was lucky enough to win 5 championships and gets the respect of the entire league upon his retirement in mistake, then you should re-watch game 7 of the NBA finals vs the Boston Celtics. Kobe was completely cold that day on offense. To make up for it, he grabbed 15 boards and played stellar D to help the Lakers get that game.

First of all, the Utah Jazz are a very good young team that happened to choke in the game vs the Clippers 2nd and 3rd unit. They have more talent than the current Rockets team and would have likely pushed the Warriors to at least 5 games vs getting swept going away. The starters were in and they really wanted to get one last win after such a disappointing finish. I should know because I took Lakers +4 thinking they would rest their starters after being officially eliminated. But they didn't and, in my perspective, they played pretty hard to win the game.