A year ago, Luka Doncic got a heckler in his native tongue. Surprised to spot a Slovenian speaker in the US, he turned around only to see Kobe Bryant.
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On December 29 last year, the Mavericks visited LA to play the Lakers at the Staples Center. The game was a feisty one at the beginning, but the Lakers pulled away in the second quarter. By the time we were in the third quarter, they held a 15-point lead and the game was all but theirs.
Luka Doncic was still causing problems to the Lakers on the defensive end though. The Slovenian had gotten off to an MVP-like start to his season, much like LeBron and Anthony Davis. If his rookie season wasn’t enough indication of his potential, he let us know all about it last year.
Bryant, who’s widely known as the greatest Laker of all time, had become a fixture at their home games last year. That is part of the reason why his death was all the more galling to us.
Kobe Bryant was heckling Luka Doncic in Slovenian
With the scores at 69-53 in the Lakers’ favour, Doncic went to the sideline to make an inbound pass. He was then shocked to see somebody heckling him in Slovenian. Turning around, he saw Kobe seated right behind him. The words could only have come from him.
“He was talking Slovenian. So I was like, ‘Who’s talking my language?’ I saw Kobe and was really surprised.”
– Luka Doncic on the heckling fan at the Lakers/Mavs game pic.twitter.com/5d0MdE5zqE
— Ballislife.com (@Ballislife) December 29, 2020
Later on All Star weekend, Luka revealed that it really was some NSFW content from the Mamba. The occasion of the question made it all the more sad, as it came 3 weeks after Bryant’s death.