During halftime of a NBA on ABC Sunday special in December, the network aired an interview of Michael Wilbon sitting down with Kobe Bryant. Wilbon’s last question was “Kobe, do you ever think about the end?”
“Oh sure,” Bryant replied.
Wilbon’s follow up question was even more pressing than the first: “When you think about it, what pops into your head?”
“Damn…what am I gonna do?” Kobe said with a snicker. “Really, really what I am gonna do…you get closer and closer to the end of the tunnel and you just know…[the end] is not around the corner but it’s down the street.”
It’s undeniable Kobe is not the player he once was. And to be honest, I genuinely don’t know how I’m going to cope with the Black Mamba’s inevitable decline.
I always hear the saying, there are two things guaranteed in life: death and taxes. Allow me to add a third item to that list, the rise and fall of any entertainer. While Kobe may be one of the most enduring players in the league, father time doesn’t treat #24 any different than the rest of us.
Heading into the upcoming season, whenever it starts, Kobe will have played a combined total of 1,103 games and 40, 145 minutes during the regular season. He’s second all-time in playoff minutes, logging 8,165. He played an additional 18 international games for team USA between 2007-2008. All in all, he’s played the equivalent of 16 NBA seasons.
With the news of Bryant undergoing platelet-rich plasma therapy in Germany, one can only wonder how many chinks can surface in Kobe’s armor before he’s no longer the same knight.
Next: The Inevitable Decline
There are defining moments in sports, in entertainment and in life that expose one’s weakness; from that point on, they’re just not the same to you. Similar to the moment when the audience realizes something is satirical, they can no longer take what they’re watching seriously.
Legendary one second, completely mundane the next.
We’ve all seen it, but choose to turn a blind eye to it. For athletes we’ll make up an excuse for them, such as “it was an off-day.” We never like to see athletes and entertainers display their vulnerability as they’re the ones we look to provide an escape from our everyday lives.
On Smackdown this past Friday, the once intimidating Kane was reduced to a filler match against Wade Barrett, a wrestler the average Joe has probably never heard of.
At Wimbledon, the great Roger Federer was up two sets against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga before Tsonga came roaring back, upsetting Federer in five sets.
At church this afternoon, I noticed a few changes in the choir. Everyone singing was either a teenager or a young adult except the last holdover from the previous choir, a middle aged woman. She stuck out like a sore-thumb.
Fortunately Kobe hasn’t had that moment where he has let his guard down. Yet.
Beginning with the right index finger injury last season, there have been subtle signs of Kobe’s decline.
In the first round matchup against the Thunder in 2010, he scored 12 and 13 points in back-to-back games; but bounced back by producing typical Kobe numbers in the next three rounds, culminating in his fifth championship.
This past year, Kobe had to work harder than ever to get to his pet spots; he was often visibly frustrated. The playoff snarl was replaced with a look of dismay.
If you asked me what were Kobe’s best moments of the past season (2010-2011), I’d highlight the fall-away jumper against Portland that sealed the game, and the floater he hit over numerous defenders in the triple overtime triumph against the Suns. The problem is both shots were made under heavy defenses, even Kobe himself acknowledged he lost some elevation in an interview with Sports Illustrated. That in itself is a tell-tale sign of Kobe’s decline.
Merely a season before that (2009-2010) there were a countless amount of Kobe highlights to choose from (just take a look at one of his miraculous buzzer beaters). To be fair, Kobe has refined his game. He now gets his points more efficiently, and he’s not as flashy as he was when he was #8.
Lest we forget, Chris Paul was the best player in the Hornets and Lakers series by a mile. On a specific play in Game 1 (when Paul recorded 33 points, 14 assists and 4 steals), Paul picked Kobe’s pocket from behind while he was dribbling up the court casually. My friend, who watching the game, with noted “Kobe would never lose the ball like that two, three years ago.” I was speechless because I knew it was true. People tend to forget that the Lakers barely outplayed the Hornets in that series.
No one can blame the sweep at the hands of Dallas on Bryant. He did all he could, no one around him stepped up. Case in point: in the decisive Game 4, Kobe scored 15 points in a quarter and a half. Once Coach Rick Carlisle realized this, he adjusted his defense accordingly, and the Lakers were doomed.
Next: The Undefeated Aspect in Sports – Time
In an article on Grantland titled ‘The Long Autumn of Roger Federer,’ the writer of the piece contests “the saddest moment in the career of a great athlete is the one when he’s tagged with the word ‘still’.”
When one is associated with the word ‘still,’ it means he or she is no longer at the pinnacle of their career but are ‘still’ able to do some of the things that made them famous in the first place.
We should be thankful as Laker fans, that we’re pondering if Kobe is ‘still’ the best player in the league rather than if Kobe Bryant is ‘still’ able to carry the Lakers.
As a die-hard Kobe fan I pray he ages gracefully. Three or four years from now, he won’t be able to score 25 plus regularly, but he will be able to put the ball in the basket in a limited role. If he’s able to accept not being the alpha dog, then he’ll ride into the sunset in style.
We love seeing our former heroes in reduced roles while remaining a prevalent part of our lives. In pop culture, Jennifer Lopez isn’t the seductive “J-Lo” anymore; she has transformed herself into an American Idol judge and is still pumping out a hit here and there.
We’ve all seen what can happen to athletes who can’t accept they’re not the player they once were.
Guys like Steve Francis and Allen Iverson have had to learn that lesson the hard way. Even Michael Jordan’s victory lap around the NBA in a Wizards uniform diminished his reputation slightly, albeit briefly.
Kobe has done what Jordan did before him: prematurely ending an era while fending off a younger one.
I hope Kobe will also be able to mirror how Jordan ended his career with the Chicago Bulls.
As a champion.