LA Lakers general manager, Rob Pelinka might have pulled off the odd shrewd move or two for his franchise but one thing he isn’t good at is lying. Rob Pelinka lied about Kobe Bryant linking up with Dark Knight star and villain, Heath Ledger.
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Yes, people can lie. And it may not be breaking news but the reason and the premise of it all were very bad. In a day Laker faithful might not forget. There was news about Rich Paul meddling with the team’s fair, Linda Rambis was called a “shadow owner”, and Magic Johnson was accused of fear-mongering.
Whew, a rough day. But the story that topped it all and perhaps a good reason why many may not even remember these other storylines surrounds Rob Pelinka. The story is about how he brazenly lied to motivate the Lakers’ squad.
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Lakers GM Rob Pelinka once lied about Kobe Bryant and Heath Ledger linking up
So, the story goes, the Lakers are in need of some extrinsic motivation and to help them, Pelinka enlisted the help of Dwyane “The Rock” Johnson to tell stories about perseverance.
In the midst of it, Rob decided that it was a good idea to tell a made-up tale. A story of how Kobe Bryant asked to have dinner with Heath Ledger.
The reason was that Bryant was inspired by The Dark Knight and wanted to talk to Ledger about it. The Dark Knight was one of the most critically acclaimed films of the decade. It even grossed $1.006 billion at the box office.
The only problem was that Heath died months before the movie was even released. Ledger received a posthumous Oscar for his role as the villain, Joker.
Pelinka narrated the story,
“There was one time when Kobe, who I worked with for 18 years, was going back to play in Madison Square Garden, and he had just seen ‘The Dark Knight! Obviously, you guys saw that movie, and he’s like, ‘Hey, hook me up with dinner with Heath Ledger, because he got so locked in to (into) that role. I want to know how he mentally went there.’ So, he had dinner with Heath, and he talked about how he locks in for a role. And Kobe used some of that in his game against the Knicks in terms of mental preparation.”
The lie was so brazen, but nobody actually caught onto it until someone had to break the news.
Sources confirm the two never met
A source that heard the tale said, “A source with direct knowledge said no such arrangement was made and no dinner ever took place.”.
And that was that. We are also pretty surprised as to why Pelinka would lie about such a tale. Kobe himself never commented on it.
While the intention might have been to fire up the young Lakers squad, it backfired tremendously. Since this incident, Rob has stayed away from too much public spotlight. For good reason we suppose.
