Kobe: Hypothetical Question - Had he stayed in Charlotte

I am taking a game-theoretic view here. Matchup sensitivity is an important thing to winning a championship, and I'm talking about much more than the Lakers series. Think of it this way, Harden is generally an A+, but against certain matchups (say vs. Kawhi Leonard or Lebron) he's a B. Kobe might be generally an A-, but against Lebron he might be a B+. How much you vary affects whether teams can plan for you. Lebron's great strength is that he is an A against everybody, even if against some particular matchups Harden might be better.

 

Kawhi isn't that good at defending Harden, I don't know where this lie originated... Even our series against the Spurs in 2017, Harden nearly matched his full regular season averages against the Spurs defense, which is incredible... until game 6. The worst game of Harden's (and almost any superstar's) career. But obviously that had nothing to do with Kawhi, who didn't even play.

 

He'd be a better version of Nique and today would be in Harden like category of all time great scorers that can't win a ring. BUT, i think people gave Kobe way too much credit on loyalty. He would have bolted on Charlotte as soon as he could to end up in LA either way where the stars would follow eventually. His career would have taken a LeBron route. The threats straight from HS to play in Europe if he couldn't play for LA or Boston? Making it seem like that was all his agent and he would have balled anywhere ....he even demanded a trade as soon the Lakers sucked after he ran Shaq out. Another thing that is being re-written is him forcing the Lakers to build a contender ASAP. Although that was the end result, he was ready to go to Chicago, but the team would have had to be completely scrapped just to make it work. The threat to sign with the Clippers was there as well. He also later mentioned post retirement that he wanted a trade to Washington to play with Michael Jordan on the Wizards. So this was prime Shaq days, probably his ego wanting to show up old Mike on his own team.

I think of Kobe much like a combo of James Harden + Lillards scoring with Dames attitude and clutch ability, + selective elite defense much like LeBron + LeBron's buddying up tactic to win rings.

 

Kobe and his fans were always trying to rewrite history much like LeBron and his fans. Kobe would act like that's not his way to do what LeBron did, but he didn't have to. He just made a single move that would make it all easier for him. Demand to play for the Lakers straight out of HS and the rest will take care of itself. It's why LeBron came to LA at this point of his career in the first place and already has a superstar and loads of veteran depth and likely another ring this year. Being a superstar for the Lakers is a whole different animal altogether vs any other historic franchise or big market. Outside of Elgin Baylor, i don't think we'll ever see another superstar in Los Angeles a large chunk of his career and not deliver on a championship. The talent just comes along with the Lakers.

 

I think Ben Wallace did. He had some GOAT defensive seasons during that short run.

Edit: Nope, Sheed!

 

I gained a higher respect for Kobe post retirement and really liked listening to his interviews any chance i got. He really grew into a very likable person. I would even take him over LeBron, but the guy had lots of faults throughout his career.
This one included which i think is worse than any Harden game and Harden gets an unbelievable amount of hate which makes me wonder how he'd be perceived if he played in LA. Though, Kobe obviously was the much more entertaining performer so that's part of it.