Kobe Bryant has been making his college rounds during the Lakers’ Grammy road trip. While in Boston, Bryant attended an international marketing class at Boston College. While in Miami, it was a business class at the University of Miami that caught his mind. And, later that night, Bryant attended the Duke vs. University of Miami men’s basketball game.
In Chicago, Bryant spoke about the disadvantages of premier high school basketball players forced to go to college, rather than having the option of taking their talents to the NBA.
Bryant was asked about the impact of players such as himself and Kevin Garnett, who were able to come to the NBA straight out of college.
“I think the reality is there’s been a lot of players who’ve come out of high school…if you do the numbers and you look at the count you probably see players who came out of high school that were much more successful on average than players that went to college for a year or two years. It seems like the system really isn’t teaching players anything if you go to college.
‘If you go to college, you play, you showcase, and you come to the pros.’
Well, that’s always been the big argument, as a player you have to go to college, you have to develop your skills and so forth and so on and then you come to the league.
We kind of got sold on that…sold on that dream a little bit. Fortunately, I didn’t really listen much to it, neither did KG, neither did LeBron. I think that worked out pretty well for all three of us.”
Would Bryant like to see it revert back to the way it was? Andrew Bynum’s 2005 draft class was the last to have the option.
“I’m always a firm believer in us being able to make our own decisions, especially as it pertains to going out and working and having a job. You should be able to go out there and make your own choices.”
Bryant and LeBron are two players that certainly didn’t need the assistance of college basketball to improve their NBA careers, but there are other arguments both for and against the current one-and-done system of college basketball.
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