Kobe Bryant sat down with Lakers.com for an extended conversation on Thursday in which he discussed the rehabilitation process for his surgically repaired left Achilles tendon, Dwight Howard's free agency and his legacy as an NBA player.
Q: On the Achilles:
Bryant: It's feeling really strong. I can walk without a limp … I can go up the stairs and just stand on my toe, which shows a lot of strength in the tendon.
Q: On the benefit of working 1-on-1 every day with the team's head physical therapist, Dr. Judy Seto:
Bryant: I've known Judy since 1998, and we finally brought her on board full time (last year). She's fantastic, man. She keeps me young. Keeps Vino alive.
Q: On what he'll specifically do to rehabilitate the Achilles after the interview:
Bryant: Immediately after this I'll jump into a form of contrast therapy, which is doing cold and then hot, cold and then hot to try and pump out some of the swelling. Then Judy will do some manual therapy to try and push out some more of the inflammation, some modalities. Then I'll get into the strengthening part, making sure I do some patterns, some single-leg balance work and then walking on the Alter G (weightless treadmill) for a little bit.
Q: On from where he draws motivation to recover:
Bryant: It's about taking on the challenge, you know, and then everything else that goes on around you are all peripheral opponents. But the challenge starts within.
Q: On being able to fall back on skills if he loses athleticism:
Bryant: It's just the way I grew up playing the game. I learned how to play from a myriad of positions and different skill sets. There were times when I wasn't the fastest guy out there because I was playing against kids that were seven or eight years older than me, so I had to figure out how to be effective. And that's helped me in my professional game, because I can adjust my game. That's why I can play through injuries, swollen ankles or loss of speed … You just adjust. I don't think it's reinventing the wheel or anything like that. If you have to play a slower game, you play a slower game. If you have to post up more, you post up more. If the explosiveness and speed is there, then it's there and you use it in moderation.
Q: On if when Mitch Kupchak and Jim Buss plug in the roster next season, they can found on Kobe being Kobe:
Bryant: That's one thing that you can really count on as long as I'm here. I'll be out there ready to go, playing at a high level.
Q: On if November or early December at the latest remains his goal for a return date:
Bryant: Absolutely. It really just depends on the tendon. When the doctor takes the Governor off me, so to speak, and says that the tendon is where we need it to be and that it's not a concern to overstretch it, that means it's on me. That means it's strengthening the calf muscle, getting in shape … I can handle that.
Q: On L.A.'s roster for next season:
Bryant: I think it really depends on what Dwight decides to do.
Q: On why he wants Howard to stay with the Lakers:
Bryant: I think his talent level, his defensive prowess. We saw what he could do at the end of the year when we all started clicking … I think that makes him extremely, extremely valuable.
Q: On the importance of Howard arriving at his own decision on where to play:
Bryant: It has to be his decision. The last thing you want to do is convince a person that they want to be here. If you have to convince them when challenges or adversity comes up next season, it's very easy to say, 'Well they had to convince me to be here anyway, I really didn't want to be here, I'd rather be (somewhere else) but they sold me on it.' You want it to be his decision. When it's something that's rooted inside of him, it's something he champions. I just want to be there to assist his decision.
Q: On what the Lakers mean to him:
Bryant: L.A. is home for me. It's the longest place I've ever stayed as a kid moving around. Being in one place for 17 years was completely foreign for me. But this is home. With the organization going forward you're going to expect the same old, same old. Figuring it out, figuring it out now. I hear the critics (of) the roster, everything is up in the air … it may seem that way now but the dust will settle. We'll have a team out there on the floor that's going to be a contender.
In the third and final part of our 1-on-1 interview with Kobe Bryant, the 15-time All-Star discusses how long he thinks he can continue to play at an elite level, reveals his all-time starting five, explains to what degree rings tell the story for a player's legacy, talks about how the game has developed in his 17 years in the league and more.
Bryant has gone back and forth about how many more years he wants to play in recent years, even suggesting at various times last season that he'd considered hanging it up after his contract expired at the end of the 2013-14 campaign.
Apparently, Bryant has changed his mind, firmly stating that he's thinking of playing at least three more years.
"I feel pretty damn confident I can be at a high level for at least another three years. I feel like how I was playing last year – I know I'll be healthy and I'll be ready to go this year – I know what I can bring. And I think I can easily do that for another three years. I think the (Achilles) injury has something to do with it. It really increased the drive. And probably San Antonio getting so close to winning No. 5, probably hurt me a little bit too. I want to make sure I push the ring count out a little further. It was really, really close there. They played phenomenally well. But it's a testament to what skill can do. To what us old guys can do if you play together, if you play with one mind and one purpose you can accomplish great things. It was inspirational for me and hopefully inspirational for the city of Los Angeles and this organization of what we can do, how this tide can change fairly quickly and we'll be looking at a parade."
Now for the all-time team: "two weeks back, I tweeted out my all-time starting five of Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Bill Russell and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar."
Lakers radio voice John Ireland countered with a team of Oscar Robertson, Bryant, LeBron James, Tim Duncan and Wilt Chamberlain. Kobe's choice, to Ireland's* chagrin and my pleasure: *In fairness, I did have the first five selections.
"Magic, Michael, Bird, Russell and Jabbar."
Of course, Kobe wasn't willing to just concede that Ireland's team, with him at shooting guard, would lose a seven-game series. I suppose we shouldn't be surprised that Bryant broke it down even further, envisioning a show down between himself and the man he's been chasing all these years.
"Dude, it's going to be back and forth … you're going to win some, you're going to lose some," he told me. "You're going to come down to the end, the ball is going to be in my hands, it'll be in Mike's hands. He'd get the best of me some games, I'd get the best of him some games. That's just how it's going to be. Back and forth, back and forth."
The biggest difference between Team A and Team B in that argument is that the first group has 31 championship rings, and the second 14. How much should rings matter as we evaluate the legacies of the greatest players?
"Basketball is the one sport where one person can really alter a team," Bryant explained. "Leadership, demeanor. If you have pieces around you that compliment each other – it has to start from the top as well (with) a great staff. But when things are equal, you have two good teams going at it, one player definitely changes the outcome of a game.
"It's not like football where a quarterback is on the sideline (half the game), or in baseball where you can intentionally walk a batter. Basketball is one of those sports where an individual has supreme outcome on whether or not you win a championship."
In sum, Bryant said that winning at that ultimate level demands not just a certain skill level from the Jordan's, Magic's and Russell's, but an unrelenting mental fortitude.
"It's about how you were able to drive a team," he said. "It's about what buttons can you push to get the team at the ultimate level."
The Gawd has spoken.......
#LWO
Who made that new gif with the water in the background. I think it needs to be extended about 3 more seconds at the end for better effect though.
