A teenage Kobe Bryant did not take much time to become a man after making it to the NBA in 1996. Unlike most other players who make it to the league young, and get overwhelmed by the money and fame they instantly get, Bryant was determined from Day 1.
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But, one can understand playing with Shaquille O’Neal had its benefits. Even if you were an 18-year-old guard who was light for his 6ft 6’ frame, you could manage pretty well with a 7ft 1’ 300-pound running like a bull with you on the court, all the time.
Hence, Kobe did not get his welcome to NBA moment until he reached the Semi-finals of the Western Conference in his rookie season.
When Kobe Bryant had his first litmus test against the Utah Jazz
Sick of getting beaten at the hands of either Hakeem Olajuwon’s Rockets or Clyde Drexler’s Blazers, Karl Malone and John Stockton led Utah were determined to get out of West in the 1997 Playoffs.
And they were not scared by the Lakers duo. In fact, the Jazz duo gave their opposite numbers the rain-check both Bryant and Shaq needed to become what they became a few years down the line, especially Kobe.
He didn’t help himself much after finally having the limelight he always wanted when he was playing almost all of Game 5 of the series because of Byron Scott’s absence from the line-up.
Being down 1-3 in the series, and having Shaq fouled out for the final minute with the game tied at 89-89 wasn’t helping either. But that should not have led to 4 air balls in any case. Yet, it did, and Kobe shot all of them.
Years later, on the Knucklehead podcast, he discussed the incident, that how wasn’t nervous but just fatigued. And how “looking at Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen” gave him the inspiration to lift weights and “get stronger”.
It took Bryant a few years to get to MJ’s level
The following season even after getting more minutes compared to 15-16 minutes off-the-bench in his rookie season, Bryant couldn’t help the Lakers and fell even more miserably to the Jazz (4-0), but this time in the Conference Finals.
They then again lost in the 1999 Conference Semi-finals to the Spurs (4-0). And that ended Bryant’s encounter with 4s once and for all. He and O’Neal went on to 3-peat after that season with the latter winning 3 Finals MVPs
Kobe would win his two Finals MVPs in 2009 and 10 when he would lead the Lakers to a double without Shaq and engrave his name as one of the greatest players of all time, arguably only second to his inspiration, Michael Jordan.
