During the recent Kobe Bryant statue unveiling, former Los Angeles Lakers head coach Phil Jackson recalled setting up a meeting between a young Bryant and Michael Jordan. Jackson recalled that upon sitting down the first thing Kobe said to Jordan was that he could beat him 1-on-1.
Surpassing Jordan was always the goal for Kobe and the Lakers legend spent his entire career trying to accomplish that. If he didn’t do it he came awfully close, but one of Bryant’s closest teammates revealed that at one point, Kobe proclaimed he was flat out better.
In the latest episode of the LADE Podcast, Lamar Odom spoke about this moment that occurred during the 2009-10 season. Odom says that after another one of Bryant’s amazing game-winning shots, he entered the bus and said that he was better than Jordan:
“I’m gonna keep it real with you. We were on the bus one night, I think this was after he hit his ninth game-winner, against Milwaukee. [Kobe] came on the bus and in front of me and Phil, he was just like ‘Yo, I’m better than Mike.’ I said ‘What?!’ He said ‘Yo, I’m better than Mike.’ I was like ‘Bean, you’re going a long way with that.’ I was like ‘What, you’re better than Mike? That’s how you’re feeling?’ If he really said that, you know he felt it. He hit nine walk-offs that season. Nine walk-offs, ’Three, two, one…’ He hit nine in one season.”
Odom had his numbers just slightly off as it was seven game-winners that Kobe hit during that season, but that is still an unbelievable number for one year. More important was Bryant’s full-on confidence in that moment as he was arguably at the peak of his powers, not only dominating individually, but also leading the Lakers to back-to-back NBA Championships.
Saying that in front of Jackson was surely done on purpose as Phil is likely the only person who could truly judge the greatness between the two. But as Odom said, if Kobe said it, he definitely meant it.
There are only a handful of players who could even approach Jordan’s level of greatness, but without a doubt the Lakers icon is one of them.
Lakers making three status for Kobe Bryant
The Lakers recently unveiled the long-awaited statue for Kobe Bryant outside of Crypto.com Arena, although there were some more news that came with it. During the ceremony, Vanessa Bryant announced that there will be three statues dedicated to Kobe at the arena with two more to come.
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