Blue is Me

Tag: kobe

  • What are your thoughts on Bam Adebayo scoring 83 points, surpassing Kobe Bryant’s famous 81-point game?

    Definitely unexpected.

    I mean, out of all NBA players to beat Kobe’s 81 pts… Bam Adebayo??? I mean, I’ve always expected *some* player to beat it at some point, given the increased scoring and fast pace we have seen the past couple of seasons, but you would think it would be somebody like Steph Curry.. Kevin Durant.. Luka Doncic.. Nikola Jokic.. Giannis.. SGA.. you know, the usual suspects for high scoring.

    Bam Adebayo was not on my bingo card – a player who averages about 19 PPG for the season. Scoring over 83 was not as shocking to me as *Bam scoring over 83*.

    As for beating Kobe, well let’s just say there are alot of salty Kobe fanboys out there

    I mean jesus.. look at all that cope

    But what do you expect? I already been telling people Kobe fans are the worst fanbase in sports. A bunch of whiny bitchy losers who always have some excuse for Kobe and willing to jump off a bridge to defend him.

    Kobe only has 1 MVP? that’s because he was robbed and the media ‘overhated’ him for the rape trial

    Kobe shot his team out of the 2004 Finals? Well he had too much drama from the rape trial and Shaq

    Kobe blew a 3–1 lead and quit on his team in the Game 7? Well he did it to spite Phil Jackson

    Kobe averaged 15 PPG in the 2000 Finals? That’s because he was injured (for 2 games out of 6 fyi)

    Kobe missed the playoffs in the middle of his prime? he was injured!

    Kobe shot his team out of the 2008 Finals? Nah man.. INJURIES again!

    Shaq carried Kobe? Nah look at these cherry picked games from the WCF!

    Kobe beat all these 50 win teams all by himself!

    Kobe willed the 2008 Olympics team to the medal all by himself!

    Kobe carried Gasol and a bunch of scrubs to 2 rings all by himself!

    The league denied Kobe the CP3 trade because they didn’t want Kobe to keep winning!

    Kobe chased Dwight and Shaq out? Well that’s because they weren’t tough enough to play with Kobe!

    Kobe got swept by 2011 Mavs? Well that’s because he was too fatigued from carrying the Lakers to 3 Finals in a row!

    Seriously the amount of excuses and BS I’ve heard from Kobe fans is another level.. for all the hate Bron fans get online (and believe me, ANYONE defending Bron gets insulted and called a bunch of lameass childish phrases online), I’ve never heard Bron fans say oh he was robbed of MVP in 2006 cause he was like second place in voting you know? or say anything about Donovan Mitchell scoring 71 as a Cav beating Bron’s record.. or say anything about Bam scoring 83 as a Heat player (overtaking Bron’s 61). With Kobe fans though, it’s always a bunch of whining and BS.

    They say Wilt’s 100 point game doesn’t count because there was no footage of it (stupid, I know. So most of human history didn’t happen then?)

    Now they say Bam’s game doesn’t count because too many free throws (free throws are part of the game last time I checked)

    Oh Bam was stat padding you say? You really think Kobe was not a stat padder? Pretty sure at the end of the 81 point game he was padding some stats cause they didn’t need 81 to beat them at the end.

    Oh Kobe’s team was down you say? How come Kobe fans never think about WHY his teams are down in the first place. 2006 Raptors were one of the worst teams in the league. Kobe the ‘best player in the world’ was down to them why exactly? It aint Kobe’s teammates fault cause they dont even get a chance to shoot since Kobe never passes to Smush or Kwame.

    Oh they played better defense back then? Then explain to me why in 2006 literally the top 14 scorers were ALL perimeter players – Kobe, Arenas, Lebron, Iverson, Pierce, Melo, Wade etc pretty sure the 2006 season – especially the Finals – was basically watching a bunch of free throws as well

    tldr; Yes Bam’s game was shocking to me – out of all the players I would have never expected him to be the one to break Kobe’s record. And Kobe fans keep crying – at least your guy will still hold the record for most FGAs in a game with 50. He’ll forever be the biggest gunner in NBA history.

  • Why do some Kobe fans see LeBron as a threat to Kobe’s legacy, and how does that affect their view of him as a Laker?

    It’s not some Kobe fans.. it’s 99% of them lol.

    And let’s keep something in mind first.. Kobe generally respected and admired Lebron heck his last tweet before he passed away was congratulating Lebron on passing his scoring record!

    But Kobe fans don’t care about this – why do Kobe fans hate Bron so much? Simple, because Bron is a better player than Kobe is and Bron is put ahead of Kobe in GOAT convos. (for a similar reason Jordan fans hate Bron too but they are slightly less delusional because Jordan has legit arguments to be ahead of Bron, unlike Kobe).

    This makes Kobe fans enraged, so they spend a lot of time posting Lebron hate and amplifying all the negatives about Lebron so that they can convince others that Kobe was the better player (in large part they have succeeded judging from all the brainwashing done online). So they endlessly post about Kobe’s 50/60 pt games, highlight his ‘mamba mentality’, his ‘clutch’ abilities and ‘killer instinct’ and ‘toughness’ and ‘loyalty’ and saying he’s a ‘winner’ while Lebron is a ‘loser’ ‘choke artist’ ‘flop master’ ‘not loyal’ ‘jumps teams’ ‘stacks the deck to win’ etc Which of course is all misleading and exagerrated narratives meant to benefit Kobe and denigrate Lebron.

    They can’t use anything statistical because Lebron beats Kobe in nearly every stat category, so instead they focus on rings and finals records and intangibles like the mentality aspect. They purposely ignore or make excuses for all of Kobe’s bad playoff and Finals moments and instead hype up all his best moments like his regular season highlights and those WCF performances against the Kings and Spurs. Then for Lebron they purposely ignore or discredit all his best playoff moments and focus on the worst – that often being the 2007 Finals and 2011 Finals because that’s all there is really for Bron’s bad performances. It’s cherry picking to the nth degree.

    And yes, because the majority of Lakers fans are not really Lakers fans but Kobe fans, that also means the majority of Lakers fans hate Lebron as well.

    For example this “fan” is actually just a Kobe fan / Lebron hater in disguise. Imagine hating on a man who brought a championship to your city like this. His arguments don’t make any sense at all. So Bron’s supposed to play defense at 41 years old? Was Magic playing defense in his PRIME? Was Kareem and Kobe playing defense in their last seasons?? I don’t think so. Why don’t they get any flak for not playing defense? Hell why doesn’t LUKA get the same hate for not playing defense despite being the de facto Lakers star over Bron?? See, it’s just irrational hate period.

  • Why don’t the Lakers respect LeBron James? Kobe has three statues—why doesn’t LeBron, who is better, have even one? He didn’t get a farewell tour and now they won’t offer him a contract, trying to push him out.

    The Lakers never really accepted Lebron and the fanbase never accepted him because they saw him as a mercenary who went from superteam to superteam to try to win. He wasn’t ‘homegrown’ the way Magic or Kobe or West was. He didn’t spend alot of time with the Lakers like Kareem (14 seasons) or win multiple titles like Shaq. His career with the Lakers is probably most similar to Wilt Chamberlain – a certified superstar who landed on the Lakers as a way to both win more titles and to close out his career.

    • Lebron will not get a statue with the Lakers. He will almost certainly get one with Cleveland and he *should* get one with Miami too.
    • Lebron’s jersey should be retired with the Lakers though. That much I do think should happen. CLE, MIA and LAL should all retire his jersey because he won a title with every one of those franchises as the best player. That should be enough for jersey retirement.
    • The 2020 ring isn’t respected by a lot of fans because Lebron won it. I don’t care what people say, that’s not an asterisk ring. Everyone played under the same conditions how can it be an asterisk? Lakers even lost home court advantage. It’s just because Bron won it and people look for ways to discredit him as much as possible that’s why.
    • Many Lakers fans are not Lakers fans at all – they are Kobe fans. and they see Bron as threatening Kobe’s legacy. Bron was always viewed as Kobe’s rival. So these fans will never ever accept Lebron and they will hate on Bron as much as possible.
    • Lakers fans are used to winning multiple championships and going to multiple Finals. Despite Bron playing for the Lakers and still putting up decent numbers into his old age, they want to see more success from him than just that one bubble ring.
    • Because Bron has so many haters they blame Bron for everything. They blame him for being LeGM and trading away teammates. They blame him for ruining the team. They blame him for recruiting teammates as well. They blame him for sitting out games. They blame him for stat padding when he plays. They blame him for flopping. They blame him for whining. They blame him whenever his teammates don’t do well enough. They blame him if his teammates do too well and say they’re carrying him. So no matter what Bron does, he gets killed for it.

  • How important are the five championship rings in ranking Kobe Bryant among the top NBA players, and do they overshadow other aspects of his career?

    The problem is casual NBA fans overrate rings way too much in the all time player discussion and Kobe has 5 of them and it’s a HUGE boost to his ranking as a result. Casuals treat these rings as if Kobe won them all by himself which is ridiculous because we have to look at the context here: he was the best player for only 2 of them. 2 FMVPs.

    And sure you can make an argument for 2001 and 2002 where Kobe offensively and defensively was close to Shaq but at the end of the day defenses were doubling Shaq – not Kobe. and in 2000 it’s not even an argument that Kobe was behind Shaq.

    I just find it ridiculous fans treat these 5 rings as all equal and Kobe won it by himself or something – then for Lebron they don’t count the 2020 ring because he played in the bubble and the 2013 one because Ray Allen saved him. Like WTF … but you count Kobe’s 2000 ring where he averaged 15 PPG in the Finals? And the 2002 ring where the NBA rigged it for the Lakers? What?

  • Why do some people rank Kobe Bryant as one of the top players despite arguments against it, and what makes this debate so passionate among fans?

    It’s literally feelings over facts.

    They ignore the stats and awards (because that would place Kobe in the fringe top 10) and their arguments are based only on feelings

    -closest to Jordan and Jordan is the GOAT so Kobe must be #2 since he’s the closest (faulty logic)

    -legendary work ethic and ‘mamba mentality’

    -killer instinct, *perceived clutch ability* (statistically not actually clutch though)

    -played through injuries, never took a night off (fans respect that)

    -scored a lot of points in a flashy way (fans love that)

    -stayed on one team (perceived loyalty despite him demanding a trade in the middle)

    -won without a ‘superteam’ (i.e only needed one other all-star to win)

    -More rings, better Finals record (casuals love this argument)

    which you’ll find is exactly the arguments used against Lebron in the GOAT convo

    -Lebron flops (modern NBA game rules)

    -Lebron does not have perceived killer instinct and clutch ability (statistically he does though)

    -Lebron takes (regular season) games off, ‘load management’

    -Lebron scores alot but not in a flashy way (Kobe perceived as more ‘skilled’)

    -Lebron played on multiple teams

    -Lebron needed ‘superteams’ to win (except for 2020, but that ring is discounted for reasons)

    -Losing Finals record (casuals love this argument)

    So you’ll see that feelings (things outside of stats/awards) are used for Kobe’s argument and against Lebron’s argument

    Casual fans don’t care about stats/awards unless it fits their narrative i.e Kobe averaged 40 PPG in this one month! He has 12x All-Def! (but will ignore Lebron’s better stats in every category and huge lead in MVPs/FMVPs)

  • Is it delusional to rank Kobe Bryant as the 4th greatest basketball player (below Jordan, Lebron and Kareem)?

    I can break down Kobe’s career like this:

    1996–1998: bench player

    1999–2004: second best player on the Lakers team that went to 4 Finals and won 3 championships

    2005–2007: missed the playoffs or bounced out of first round

    2008–2010: 3 Finals in a row and a 2-peat as the best player

    2011–2013: best player but struggled in the playoffs

    2014–2016: pretty much a shell of himself at this point

    So Kobe’s top 5 argument is pretty much based on what? He was the best player on 3 Finalists and 2 championship teams. Honestly, it’s a pretty weak argument for a top 5 player when you break it down this way.

    In fact, Hakeem was the best player on 3 Finalists and 2 championship teams too – also had 1 mvp and 2 fmvps – while also being a much better defender and averaging more in the playoffs. But nobody puts Hakeem top 5 right?

    And as much as Kobe fans want to say ‘oh his 2009–2010 teams were full of scrubs’ no they weren’t and they certainly weren’t worse than what Hakeem had to carry to those Finals.

    People really need to stop putting Kobe up there – I’m certain its all because of the 5 rings, he scores a lot in the regular season, he’s the ‘closest’ to Jordan kind of BS that casuals all eat up but objectively take a look at his career and it aint it