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By Marc Stein
ESPN.com
You still have a problem with Kobe Bryant hoisting 30-something shots some nights?
What's your stance on 30-point quarters?
The only issue you could have Tuesday night is with the (apparently) joint coach/player decision that Kobe would sit for the entire fourth ... after Bryant rung up a tidy 62 points for Phil Jackson through three.
Not me, though. I actually side with Kobe and the Zenmeister on this one.
After Kobe went for 30 points in the third quarter alone, to put the Los Angeles Lakers up by 34 in an eventual 112-90 trouncing of the Dallas Mavericks, I wouldn't have risked No. 8 getting hurt in a game that was already over. I'd want to take every precaution to keep Kobe healthy in the hope that that this was merely the first time this season he makes a run at 70 or 80.
A select few of us out there -- a group in which I can smugly claim membership because I've written this once or twice already -- applaud Kobe for shooting and shooting and shooting. And not just on the nights he goes for 62. Reason being: Kobe's Lakers aren't exactly teeming with outlets for his passes.
As stated in this cyberspace more than once recently, this is the thinnest, weakest team Phil Jackson has ever coached. As well as the Lakers have played in their 9-3 December, with Kobe taking more than 24 shots only four times this month, you can expect plenty of occasions as the season unfolds where Bryant absolutely has to take 30-odd shots for L.A. to have a chance to win.
Unless, of course, you believe in Smush Parker as a No. 3 option and consider Brian Cook to be a legit starting four-man for a playoff-caliber team.
Right.
To quote my dear friend Sam Smith of the Chicago Tribune, a fellow backer of Kobe Unplugged: "Right now, just enjoy the show."
Good advice.
The time to torch Kobe for shooting too many shots is when the Lakers have re-established a core with a real future ... and he's still firing away instead of making teammates better.
This is a time to be grateful for spectacles like Tuesday night's at Staples Center, when an assist total of zero didn't change the fact that Kobe was wicked good. Too good for his own good, really.
How good?
Entering the fourth quarter, with the Lakers safely ahead by 95-61, you could read the scoreboard another way.
Kobe 62, Dallas 61.
It was simply too ridiculous for Phil to put Kobe back in.
I was fortunate enough to be courtside in L.A. on April 24, 1994 when San Antonio's David Robinson, with help from a point guard named Avery Johnson, savaged the Clippers for 71 points.
This, though, was sicker. Slicker, too.
Robinson's eruption came on the last day of the 1993-94 regular season, with a scoring title at stake and against a 27-55 opponent that didn't want to be there. This was Kobe needing only three-quarters of a game to match Tracy McGrady's 62 points for Orlando on March 10, 2004 -- the league's two biggest individual outputs in the past decade-plus since Robinson's.
This was Kobe, knowing that a Mavericks coach named Avery Johnson would swarm him 5-on-1 after Bryant scored 43 points in Dallas just last week, inflicting offensive destruction in a manner that could only remind you of one other guy.
It's sacrilege to some, I know, but you can consider this another step in Bryant's bid to become the first of the NBA's many Next Jordans to actually come close to matching No. 23.
If not?
At the very least, let's drop the pleas for more passes to Chris Mihm and Laron Profit and admit that your appetite for watching Kobe launch has been restored.
Marc Stein is the senior NBA writer for ESPN.com. To e-mail him, click here.
ESPN.com
You still have a problem with Kobe Bryant hoisting 30-something shots some nights?
What's your stance on 30-point quarters?
The only issue you could have Tuesday night is with the (apparently) joint coach/player decision that Kobe would sit for the entire fourth ... after Bryant rung up a tidy 62 points for Phil Jackson through three.
Not me, though. I actually side with Kobe and the Zenmeister on this one.
After Kobe went for 30 points in the third quarter alone, to put the Los Angeles Lakers up by 34 in an eventual 112-90 trouncing of the Dallas Mavericks, I wouldn't have risked No. 8 getting hurt in a game that was already over. I'd want to take every precaution to keep Kobe healthy in the hope that that this was merely the first time this season he makes a run at 70 or 80.
A select few of us out there -- a group in which I can smugly claim membership because I've written this once or twice already -- applaud Kobe for shooting and shooting and shooting. And not just on the nights he goes for 62. Reason being: Kobe's Lakers aren't exactly teeming with outlets for his passes.
As stated in this cyberspace more than once recently, this is the thinnest, weakest team Phil Jackson has ever coached. As well as the Lakers have played in their 9-3 December, with Kobe taking more than 24 shots only four times this month, you can expect plenty of occasions as the season unfolds where Bryant absolutely has to take 30-odd shots for L.A. to have a chance to win.
Unless, of course, you believe in Smush Parker as a No. 3 option and consider Brian Cook to be a legit starting four-man for a playoff-caliber team.
Right.
To quote my dear friend Sam Smith of the Chicago Tribune, a fellow backer of Kobe Unplugged: "Right now, just enjoy the show."
Good advice.
The time to torch Kobe for shooting too many shots is when the Lakers have re-established a core with a real future ... and he's still firing away instead of making teammates better.
This is a time to be grateful for spectacles like Tuesday night's at Staples Center, when an assist total of zero didn't change the fact that Kobe was wicked good. Too good for his own good, really.
How good?
Entering the fourth quarter, with the Lakers safely ahead by 95-61, you could read the scoreboard another way.
Kobe 62, Dallas 61.
It was simply too ridiculous for Phil to put Kobe back in.
I was fortunate enough to be courtside in L.A. on April 24, 1994 when San Antonio's David Robinson, with help from a point guard named Avery Johnson, savaged the Clippers for 71 points.
This, though, was sicker. Slicker, too.
Robinson's eruption came on the last day of the 1993-94 regular season, with a scoring title at stake and against a 27-55 opponent that didn't want to be there. This was Kobe needing only three-quarters of a game to match Tracy McGrady's 62 points for Orlando on March 10, 2004 -- the league's two biggest individual outputs in the past decade-plus since Robinson's.
This was Kobe, knowing that a Mavericks coach named Avery Johnson would swarm him 5-on-1 after Bryant scored 43 points in Dallas just last week, inflicting offensive destruction in a manner that could only remind you of one other guy.
It's sacrilege to some, I know, but you can consider this another step in Bryant's bid to become the first of the NBA's many Next Jordans to actually come close to matching No. 23.
If not?
At the very least, let's drop the pleas for more passes to Chris Mihm and Laron Profit and admit that your appetite for watching Kobe launch has been restored.
Marc Stein is the senior NBA writer for ESPN.com. To e-mail him, click here.
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