There is always a day when a player begins his journey to become a legend. And Kobe Bryant’s was not, despite everything, on June 19, 2000. A few days earlier, against the Blazers, the guard emerged in the seventh game of the Western Conference finals, when Mike Dunleavy’s defense steadily prevented the Lakers from passing balls to Shaq. When that happened and with a difference for the Oregon team that reached 16 points at the beginning of the fourth quarter, the Black mamba decided it was his moment: 25 points, 11 rebounds, 7 assists and 4 blocks with only 2 losses, a +8 with him on the court and a perfect defense over Steve Smith, a player he left 0 points in the last 11 : 40 party. That day, with the Lakers down and out, psychologically out of the series after allowing themselves to tie a 3-1 lead, Kobe changed history and made a name for himself in the best league in the world. He became great against the team of the great stars (Sabonis, Stoudemire, Pippen, Smith, Brian Grant, Bonzi Wells, Schrempf …) And, at 79-79, he made two free throws, a jump basket against Scottie Pippen and then assisted Shaq to sentence the game and be part of one of the most iconic photos in NBA history.
None of that happened on June 19, 2000, a few days after the heroism of the prodigal son took place. Kobe always thought his path to NBA Olympus was grounded in predestination, courage, pride and his fervent desire to become the greatest player of all time. He was a young boy who had set a series of goals in his childhood, and he fought every day against himself to achieve them. The airballs against the Jazz and the eliminations when they were candidates in 1997, 1998 and 1999 were sobering for some Lakers who said goodbye to Del Harris and cheerfully greeted Phil Jackson, who metaphorically threw himself into the arms of the franchise and of Jeannie Buss, daughter of the owner, literally. The Maestro Zen promised to Doctor Buss three and up to four rings on the day of its presentation, and his self-confidence surprised the president. And, in his first season, he led the Lakers to a 67-15 record, exploited the more animalistic version of Shaquille O’Neal and began to deal with Kobe Bryant, in what would be the first steps of a relationship that marked the next decade of the NBA. Personally for them. And narratively for everyone else.
Phil Jackson made a team for him: he signed Ron Harper and AC Green, the last stronghold of the Lakers in the Showtime. He let Robert Horry have stripes, he put veterans like John Salley on the roster, made the offensive triangle so Shaq was stocked with balls and managed to control Kobe’s ego just enough to be successful. O’Neal was named captain and Harper, participant of the last three rings of the Bulls, second captain, to the detriment of a Kobe whose spirit would have to be contained. Derek Fisher became someone important on and off the court and a forward like Glen Rice, a former All Star with the Hornets, came to the team. In fact, the brand new Los Angeles signing came before Scottie Pippen, a special request from a Jackson who got mad at Jerry West for not seeing his request fulfilled. The General Manager, meanwhile, could not enter the locker room before, after or during the games by order of the coach. The relationship deteriorated, West withdrew from the entity, personally separated from Doctor Buss and left the franchise at the end of the season after 40 years of diligent service and one last special favor, landing Kobe Bryant in the draft. It is said soon.
Yellow fever returns to the top
Andrés Montes spoke of yellow fever to refer to those Lakers. Soon, O’Neal’s superiority over the rest and power became apparent, raised to the top and at the total and absolute climax of his sports career: 29.7 points (career top), 13.6 rebounds (second best), 3.8 assists (doubling his numbers after Jackson’s arrival) and 3 blocks. He was MVP of the season, of the All Star and would also be of the Finals. But Kobe would be the one who would deal with his weight, his deep introspection and his ability to overcome by not seeing himself as the absolute leader of a team that he considered, and ultimately would be, his. The Black mamba he went to 22.5 points, with more than 6 rebounds and 5 assists, and had a historically good defensive season that was not rewarded with the Best Defender award due to the NBA custom, which became a tradition at that time, for always give the award to tall men. That year Alonzo Mourning, another expert pivot of the time, repeated. And deservedly, because the fact that it had been just another winner does not mean that the one who won it did so unfairly.
In the end, and after 67 victories, everything would be decided in the fourth game of the Finals. The Lakers reached the last round of the playoffs after beating the Kings in a tachycardic way (3-2), the Suns of Jason Kidd (4-1) and the Blazers in the aforementioned historical series that the West decided. The Pacers, after two consecutive Eastern finals, reached the final series in the third and final year of the Larry Bird era, who promised that he would be three years on the Indiana bench … and he fulfilled it, a rare thing in a world of broken promises. Bucks, Sixers and Knicks were the victims of the Indianapolis franchise, which could do nothing in the first two games against an absolutely unstoppable Shaquille, with those Wilt Chamberlain numbers that not even Michael Jordan, in his titles, could emulate: 43 + 19, with 4 assists in the initial duel, to which he also added 3 blocks; and 44 + 24, with 4 assists and 3 blocks in the second. Something unappealable that was overshadowed by a fact that could be decisive: Jalen Rose, who went to 30 points and 9 rebounds in that game, put his foot under Kobe Bryant after he tried a jump shot, in a play very similar to the one we saw with Zacha Pachulia and Kawhi Leonard.
Bryant did not play in that game again and wanted to jump to the first in that place that prays that in 49 states it’s basketball but this is INDIANA. But Phil Jackson saw him so in pain that he did not let him jump onto the track. The Lakers lost by 9 and faced the fourth, the key, with the mission of winning or seeing how their rivals tied the tie. Kobe asked, almost begged Jackson to introduce him to the game and the Zen Master relented and included him in the quintet. And it was his night, marked by a variant starring Larry Bird, that sat Rick Smits, a center with a very good hand, in the last quarter, when Shaq was with 5 fouls and the duel was in a fist. Smits came out in extra time, scored 8 points without a miss (3 field goals and 2 free throws), took the sixth off O’Neal and confirmed that Bird had made a mistake in the fourth quarter by leaving him on the bench. And at that moment, when the Lakers were without their great reference, the man emerged who just a short time before was writhing in pain every time he rested his ankle, an injury from a play that Rose recognized, some time later, that it had been intentionally.
Kobe scored 8 points in overtime on 4-of-5 shooting from the field, gave a master classs from 6 meters, put a tremendous plug on Austin Crosherese that generated applause from his bench (Shaq, sent off, in the lead) played shots with many seconds on the scoreboard and, at 117-118 for the Angelenos, grabbed an impressive rebound off a whimsical attempt by Brian Shaw and pushed the ball against the board with 5.9 seconds to go to give the Angelenos an advantage which would later be final. A last free throw by the Pacers and the failure of Reggie Miller (35 points with 6 of 9 in triples) certified the victory of the Lakers, the final 118-120 and a 3-1 that Indiana would no longer be able to lift. The Lakers, who lost the fifth game, resolved in the sixth with 26 points and 10 rebounds and 4 assists from Kobe, and 41 points, 12 rebounds and 4 blocks from Shaquille, ultimately MVP of the Finals. And that was always Shaq’s team; But never, in the history of the NBA, has a second sword been so close to the first nor has it managed to converge in such a way with the first, to pass over it as of 2003 and then rise up, with the farewell of O’Neal and the controversy that accompanied him, as the face of a project that was definitely his.
That was Kobe’s game, his first big showing in the NBA Finals. And while his first step toward becoming a legend was Game 7 of the series that decided the West playoffs, the resilience and endurance to pain displayed in the fourth round against the Pacers allowed Phil Jackson to have a deja vu that provoked the nostalgic memory of Jordan. And this is how the mythical coach remembers it in one of those books in which he reviews his memories, Eleven rings: “It was the first time that Kobe reminded me of Jordan“And it was not because of the obsession of the Black mamba for His Airness. Nor because of the almost millimeter imitation of the movements of the basketball player he loved so much. It was the endurance of the ankle pain, the resistance to blows, the enormous inner strength that emanated from his person. All that was what allowed Kobe to be, and to continue being today, the person who has come closest, or even competed, with the greatest voracious desire to win in NBA history. A game in which he finished, at 21, with 28 points (14 of 27 in field goals), 4 rebounds and 5 assists. Almost nothing.
