Lakers star Carmelo Anthony reveals his confusing relationship with franchise legend Kobe Bryant
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Fans can forget it at times, but Carmelo Anthony has been in the league for a very long time.
As a player, he immediately hit the ground running, becoming one of the better scorers in the league as a rookie. And as time went on, he only got better.
Like many other players in the NBA, this put Kobe Bryant on notice of the guy at the time. And as we all know, the Mamba was perhaps the most competitive player in the history of the NBA… okay MJ fans, second best.
Kobe Bryant vs. Carmelo Anthony were some of the best battles. pic.twitter.com/0BautmxWVJ
— Hoop Central (@TheHoopCentral) June 28, 2019
With that in mind, you’d expect the players to have a strictly rival-esque relationship during every battle. However, that wasn’t exactly the case.
In a recent interview, Melo revealed all the details of the nature of his relationship with Bryant. And let’s just say, you’re going to want to hear about it.
Carmelo Anthony reveals how his relationship with the late great Kobe Bryant kept fluctuating with the occasion
If you want to learn how to compartmentalize, take the example of Kobe Bryant.
During his playing career, despite all the noise in his life, the man gave people buckets on the court. And despite being friendly with his USA teammates during the Olympics, the man wasn’t afraid to throw a few elbows at them while they played against each other in the NBA. At least, that’s according to Carmelo Anthony, who recently had this to say about his relationship with the Lakers legend, as per Lakers Daily.
“The greatest, man… That (Western Conference Finals 2009) was my moment where me and Kob became – before that we went to the Olympics. We became very close. But we became close on some disrespectful s—. You know Kob, he going into your neck. He elbowing you. I had my braids back then, too, so he touching my head. I’m like, ‘Don’t touch my head. Don’t touch me no more, dawg.’ He’s smirking. He’s throwing his little s— elbows, and ’09 came, and it was like, I remember we hugged before the game, and he was like, ‘It’s war.’ I said, ‘It’s war. Let’s get it. It ain’t gonna be nothing easy.’”
The Lakers star continued.
“And I just remember him telling me, ‘I’ll guard you in the fourth. They ain’t gonna make no calls on me. They ain’t gonna call no s— on me in the fourth,’” Melo continued. “And I used to try to beat him up though. I was bigger than him, so I used to try to beat him up, be physical with him. He come back, elbow me. I come back, elbow him. He laughing, talking, ‘That’s all you got?’”
Yikes.
Well, at the end of the day, that’s one of the biggest reasons why we all love Kobe. His ‘win at all costs’ mentality gave us fans some of the greatest basketball memories we have ever received.
We miss you, Kobe Bryant. We always will.
