why is he wearing 24 this year and not 8?

11/4/2006 12:51:08 AM

Dunno if there was an official reason.

Most logical one is that he wanted to change numbers so he could help change his image.

11/4/2006 12:53:37 AM

image and

23 + 1 = 24 for jordan, lebron, etcetera is what the word on the street is

11/4/2006 12:54:26 AM

Isn't it obvious? He's a fan of

11/4/2006 1:22:06 AM

google "Kobe Bryant switch to 24" and you'll find reasons from the acceptable (it was his childhood number) to the esoteric (signifies a new half of his career) to the odd (he's a fan of jack bauer) to the mundane (he's trying to one up Jordan).

11/4/2006 1:49:17 AM

because its teh 24/7 condom with odem.

kobe is scoring 24 hours

odem is behind him 7 days a week.

and kobe is also the greatest to ever play the game so he can be whatever number floats his boat.

11/4/2006 2:51:22 AM

24 hours in a day
24 seconds in a shot clock

11/4/2006 3:35:50 AM

Quote :

"and kobe is also the greatest to ever play the game so he can be whatever number floats his boat."

eh. not so much.

11/4/2006 3:38:51 AM

haha, yeah that made me laugh too

11/4/2006 7:57:55 AM

Quote :

"and kobe is also the greatest to ever play the game right now so he can be whatever number floats his boat."

More accurate

11/4/2006 11:12:09 AM

he wanted to be a factor in the game

2 x 4 = 8

11/4/2006 11:13:48 AM

3 x 8 = 24

He's 3x as good as the old Kobe

11/4/2006 11:16:51 AM

2³ x 3 = 24

3 times as good as jordan when jordan is leaning to the side

11/4/2006 11:18:08 AM

Kobe isn't the best player in the game right now. His skills are right up there at the top, but I bet you wouldnt find a single coach in the league who would want Kobe as their number one player if they wanted to win a ring. He isn't a good team player and he has a bad attitude. He hasn't won anything since he got really good because he wants the ball ALL the time and ran his other players and coaches out of town. He will never be the best player in the league with his ego and attitude the way they are. Yes he has mad skills and it a good shooter in the clutch, but he is not a team player at all and their are other guys out there who are and have skills to equal Kobe.

Oh, and who really cares that he changed his number. I personally think it was to try and one up Jordan though....goodluck with that.

11/4/2006 11:25:48 AM

he is a team player. he has 3 rings.

11/4/2006 11:28:45 AM

Shaq won those 3 rings with Kobe as his sidekick... then Kobe got the big-head and started hogging the ball and the Lakers started to suck, then Kobe ran Shaq out of town and got Phil fired. Well he was lucky enough to get Phil back, but he won't win anymore rings unless he goes back to paying the way he did in his early years.

11/4/2006 11:31:45 AM

That's retarded

11/4/2006 11:43:32 AM

i totally agree, it is retarded... but that's what happened

11/4/2006 11:47:38 AM

no, I mean

11/4/2006 11:59:42 AM

kobe bryant is no michael jordan

and will never be as good

fact of life

11/4/2006 12:09:38 PM

Of course Kobe isn't the best player in the league right now. He's still at about 85-90% while he's still getting over that knee surgery.

When he's at full strength, then he'll be the best player in the league.

11/4/2006 12:10:34 PM

He'll be the best scorer in the league when he's at 100%

Great players actually know how to pass the ball and don't turn it over all the fucking time like he does. Lebron is only in his 4th year and he's 10x the passer that Bryant will ever be.

11/4/2006 12:31:37 PM

^

Turnover Avg for 2005-2006 Season

1. Gilbert Arenas
2. Dwyane Wade
3. Steve Nash
4. Paul Pierce
5. Allen Iverson
6. Lebron James
7. Joe Johnson
8. Kobe Bryant

So apparently, Kobe doesn't turn the ball over as often as any of the other "big time passers" in the league. He's also very capable of passing the ball. If you watched the game last night, he made some very sweet passes to some cutters and whatnot.

P.S. Kobe had more assists than Lebron last night, FYI.

11/4/2006 12:39:12 PM

Kobe has skills, I'm not arguing that he is one of the most skilled players in the NBA, but a great NBA player has the ability to make the players around him great just by being on the floor... Kobe has never had that ability. Michael Jordan was a perfect example of that and Lebron James has that same ability and Dwayne Wade is getting their. I loved Kobe in his early days before he got so selfish with the ball. How can you argue the fact that Kobe won 3 rings when Shaq was the leader of the team, and when Kobe started trying to take over the Lakers stopped winning.

11/4/2006 12:59:11 PM

Quote :

"Lebron James has that same ability and Dwayne Wade is getting their."

Wade is nowhere near LeBron in this regard.

There's really only one other mediocre/good player on the Cavs, whereas the Heat are stacked with former all-stars.

11/4/2006 1:06:39 PM

mj was sooo good he made pippen a hall of famer.

11/4/2006 1:09:23 PM

correct, that is why I said Wade is "getting there", if he continues to progress at the rate he has since he was drafted, he will be a great player and have that abilty. Not many players have had that ability in the past few years. Since Jordan I would say Hakeem Olajuwon, Kevin Garnett, Shaq, Tim Duncan, Allen Iverson (To a certain degree, he definately has a shoot first mentality even when sometimes he shouldn't, but he has lead poor teams deep into the playoffs), Steve Nash (he isn't a great player in the typical sense, but nobody can argue that he makes his teammates great, and he has won consecutive MVP's) and there might be more that I am forgetting off the top of my head

11/4/2006 1:12:44 PM

Kobe is still relatively young. He's been in the league for some 11 seasons, but he's only 28. People keep saying that he can't change, when he's obviously trying to.

He found out the hard way that he can't do it by himself. Jordan had to learn the same lesson before he could get better. Kobe is learning it too. He was spoiled by having a talent like Shaq around him so he could get those three rings. He thought he could do it on his own, and he was humbled as a result.

Kobe may have never had the ability to make the players around him great, but he's certainly working to attain that ability. He certainly didn't hurt the team last night when he joined them in his first game. I found it funny that he didn't even try to hit the big shots at the end of the game. Odom hit the key free throws, Turiaf hit a shot, and he even passed it to Smush, who was curling in the paint to set up the go ahead score.

Lebron is a good team player, but he still has things he needs to work on before he can truly be great. (Defense, free throws, post game). Kobe pretty much has all the skills, he just needs to learn how to play better team ball. I think that Kobe can meet his goal faster than Lebron can.

[Edited on November 4, 2006 at 1:21 PM. Reason : .]

11/4/2006 1:20:01 PM

people got mad at him last year for trying to set his teamates up in game 7. damned if you do damned if you dont

11/4/2006 1:22:45 PM

Yeah, some people got mad when he lit up Dallas for 60+ after three quarters because he didn't play the fourth quarter and he should've given the fans what they wanted.

And then some people got mad when he put 81 on Toronto, even though it was all in the flow of the game, because he was apparently running it up on the poor Raptors.

If you didn't like Kobe to begin with, you're basically not going to ever like him. He's just one of those guys that you either love or hate, and it doesn't change.

11/4/2006 1:26:15 PM

^^^ lebron is a lot younger then Kobe.... even if Kobe matures into a great player, Lebron will do so way earlier in terms of age. He has only been in the league like 3 years. The goals that Kobe needs to meet are the hardest to learn. A lot of guys have the physical talent but lack the "greatness". Lebron has the "greatness" and pretty much all of the physical abilities. I'm not saying that Kobe will never get there because he should have several good years left in which to work on it, but he will not get there nearly as fast as Lebron.

11/4/2006 1:34:45 PM

Quote :

"correct, that is why I said Wade is "getting there""

You don't know if he's "getting there" because he plays with former all-stars and he's really not even making them look better.

Also, how can you even being to say that LeBron has this "greatness" nonsense, but Kobe doesn't?

[Edited on November 4, 2006 at 1:38 PM. Reason : .]

11/4/2006 1:35:44 PM

Kobe won't need to work on getting there in a few years. I'm pretty sure that he'll be able to turn the corner right now. Last night was a good showing of that. The second half of the season last year was a good showing of that. He's saying the right words, he's been a good mentor and teammate to the younger players, and the team is meshing. He's trusting in his teammates to do their part and it's not the Kobe show anymore.

I'm not going to go and say that his ability to be a team player will correlate to the amount of assists he gets this season. He's doing the things on and off the court to be the man. Granted, we'll have to see how he handles things when the team struggles, but for now, he certainly commands greatness and he is the most talented player in the league when he's at 100%.

11/4/2006 1:43:33 PM

^^^ You're saying that it's easier to learn how to play good D and become a good FT shooter than it is to start passing the ball more?

11/4/2006 3:11:53 PM

Kobe is the best player in the NBA. Quit smokin crack t-dubbers

11/4/2006 4:23:52 PM

Quote :

"You don't know if he's "getting there" because he plays with former all-stars and he's really not even making them look better."

FORMER all-stars...walker, payton, and shaq are all on the downsides of their career. they aren't near all-star caliber anymore

11/4/2006 5:20:58 PM

^

Yeah, but is it that big of a surprise when a former all star has a big game, when they've been known to do it in the past? And when that happens, is it because Wade all of a sudden made them play as if they used to be All Stars, or the fact that they were capable of having a good game in the first place? It's hard to give credit to Wade when it comes to that.

11/4/2006 6:25:07 PM

Quote :

""and kobe is also the greatest to ever play the game so he can be whatever number floats his boat.""

wilt chamberlain, if you're gonna argue that there is ONE greatest player ever

11/4/2006 6:31:02 PM

guys guys, Kobe changed his number because of the homesexual relationship he started with Jeff Gordon. God 24 +24, what does that equal?

11/4/2006 7:50:28 PM