Kobe Bryant, Hardest Working Man in Show Business

After playing somewhat poorly in a tough loss against the Miami Heat last Friday, Lakers guard Kobe Bryant did something that was as predictable as it was constructed.

He remained at American Airlines arena long after the game had ended, shooting jumpers for several hours with only a couple of ball boys, a few reporters, and a conveniently rolling camera to keep him company.

A lot of people will see Bryant’s extracurricular shooting session as yet another piece of evidence in support of the idea that Bryant cares more about winning, works harder and leads by example better than anyone else in the league. Just look at Yahoo Sports’ Adrian Wojnarowski, who was gracious enough to live tweet Bryant’s shooting session.

Ugh. You can almost hear him humming the Rocky theme as he typed those out.

It’s not fair to single out Wojnarowski by the way. You can find many other examples of sports writers waistbanding their boners long enough to type out slack-jawed odes to Kobe’s work ethic here and here,

These people were fooled by Kobe Bryant, because I don’t think he shot basketballs into the wee hours of the night because he is some kind of basketball Mandala artist. I believe he staged his late night shoot around because he wants people to think that’s what he is.

Let’s look back at Bryant’s failures in the closing minutes of Friday’s game. After nailing a 28 ft. 3-pointer to tie the game at 88 and doing his underbite face thing, Kobe gets stripped by Dwyane Wade on the next possession, which leads to a fast break dunk for LeBron James.

On the next possession Kobe catches the inbounds pass, and with 24 seconds left on the shot clock he decides to chuck a 3-pointer. Airball.

On the following Heat possession Kobe plays some truly awful pick and roll defense as Wade explodes by him for an easy layup.

The next time Kobe touches the ball he fumbles it out of bounds for a Lakers turnover.

The game ends with Kobe clanging a 30 ft. 3-pointer attempt off of the front of the rim.

Looking back at those last few minutes of the game, it’s pretty clear that Kobe’s failures were derived from poor shot selection, (even the 28 footer that went in can be described as ill-advised) bad defensive awareness and a lack of ball security.

So how exactly is shooting jumpers for two hours after the game supposed to help remedy these issues?

It isn’t.

It’s only meant to keep Kobe’s carefully constructed image intact, so that even in defeat we can still find an excuse to praise him for wanting it more than anyone else. So it’s not surprising when Heat beat writer Ira Winderman tweeted that Kobe did have access to a private practice facility after the game, but instead chose to work out in the empty arena.

I’m willing to bet that there weren’t any cameras in the practice facility.

It’s not like this is the first time we’ve seen this kind of behavior from Kobe, either. Remember the filmic hand job that was Spike Lee’s Kobe Doin’ Work? The movie was billed as a documentary, but Kobe came off like an actor rather than a subject.

The guy who constantly bitches at referees, sneers disapprovingly at his teammates and sits in silence on the bench had suddenly vanished. Instead what we saw on the screen was a calm, jovial guy who goes out of his way to encourage his teammates and chit chat with Sasha Vujacic. (Easily the most ridiculous part of the movie)

"Does this make me look intense? God I hope
this makes me look intense."

Anyone who has watched Kobe Bryant play more than 2 times will understand which one of these personas is real, and which one is not.

If Kobe really wanted it more than anyone else, he could have found a much better use of his time following Friday’s game. He could have studied game film to figure out how to improve his pick and roll defense with Pau Gasol, or he could have done some dribbling drills to make sure that he doesn’t get his pocket picked again in the final minutes of a close game.

Personally, I think he would have been best served drafting up a Craigslist ad that would read something like, “NBA player seeks personal assistant to stand behind the bench and scream ‘Hey fuckhead, don’t forget to pass the ball!’ at me during the last four minutes of every game. If interested send references and resume to Bmamba69@gmail.com.”

Then again, none of those things are going to look very good on camera.