Karan Karia – Staff Writer
After the Los Angeles Lakers won the 2010 NBA Finals, Kobe Bryant climbed on to the scorers table amid an endless cloud of confetti, stretched his arms wide and bellowed out to the Lakers faithful gazing up at him. It’s an iconic image. That photo may even become a statue outside of Staples Center one day. It is the exuberation of a champion captured in a still frame.
Yet as I look back at the Mamba’s historic 20-year career, that image isn’t the first one that comes to mind. In fact, I hardly think of the championships at all.
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Instead, what I think about are the games in the dog days of the regular season back when the Lakers sported a starting lineup of Smush Parker and the infamous Kwame Brown. Most nights the Purple and Gold had a slim chance of victory, but ask anyone in attendance and they would have guaranteed you a win.
We never felt like we were going to lose. We had Kobe.
Over the course of his career, No. 24 made the impossible look routine so many times that you actually got numb to his greatness. Furthermore, you expected it. Any jumper against any defender from anywhere on the court was going to go in. The ball had an inherent responsibility to find the rim, for Kobe Bryant had shot it. It isn’t easy to incite such levels of faith among a group of people, no matter how irrational they may be, but we knew that every time Kobe stepped on the court there was the potential for something truly special to happen.
That potential found itself fulfilled more often than not. The 81-point game, single handedly outscoring the Mavericks over the course of three quarters, and 36 game-winners over his career are just a few examples. There are far too many unbelievable moments to recap, but one stands out above the others.
In 2006, the Lakers barely squeaked into the playoffs behind Kobe’s 35.4 points per game. The rest of the team was a trainwreck and Los Angeles faced the No. 2 Phoenix Suns in the first round of the playoffs. With a 2-1 series lead, Game 4 went down to the wire. Kobe hit a twisting, game-tying layup in the final seconds of regulation to send the game to overtime. With 6.1 seconds left in OT, Luke Walton faced a jump ball against Steve Nash. Walton tipped it to Kobe, who picked it up near mid-court.
Freeze the frame. Anyone who had been following Kobe that season knew that the game was already over. Dribbling up the court and pulling up from the right elbow was just a formality. That the shot was going in was inevitable. Watch Kobe’s reaction as the ball leaves his hands. He knows it’s money. There was no other possible way for that game to end.
Moments like that encapsulate the Kobe Bryant experience. No matter the situation, no matter the deficit, we had a reason to believe. Above everything else, that’s what I will miss the most.
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As Kobe’s time in the NBA comes to a close, all I can say is thank you. Thank you for 20 years of inspiration, of continued dedication to greatness. You will be dearly missed.