Kobe Bryant puts up an absurd 45 points on 20-26 shooting in December 2000. Kobe has the ball in clutch time in a 1 point game and the opposing announcer has a panic attack when Kobe gets the ball. “HE’S GOING TO NEED HELP, PLEASE HELP”
That’s a great commentator. Who is that. He called that brilliantly. Felt like a fan watching the game and you can hear his heartbreak when Kobe touches the ball
Calvin Murphy
Knowledgeable fans (of the game) who happen to commentate as their job are the best 🫡
Especially when they were also Hall of Fame Basketball players. Calvin Murphy was the Rockets color commentator, but he wanted to be on that court himself to tell a teammate to switch over to double Kobe (Calvin is 5’9”)
Calvin Murphy would literally watch a guy and be like, “his form is off tonight, I can tell he’s doing a weird thing with his off-hand” and then go pull them aside during halftime.
He was a great shooter, and held the record for consecutive made free throws for about 17 years.
Calvin Murphy isn’t as known around the world as he should be, but here are 2 legends coaching us and everyone they ever met. Red Auerbach and Calvin Murphy giving ball lessons
https://youtu.be/x1Yd1hCZrCk?si=gQl2jAbh3vGV1HIK
45 points on 20-26 shooting??? Wtf
Just checked the box score and Kobe only had 4 free throws, meanwhile Shaq had 22 lol
Shaq really would have had Wilt numbers if he became elite at free throws
Which is funny because Wilt himself was bad at free throws and refused to change his form for the same reason as Shaq
The season Wilt averaged 50 was Wilt’s best free throw % season (61%) after he experimented shooting them underhand.
Had Wilt shot underhand through his career at the line, he probably would have had another 1200 points for his career assuming he made about 61% on average.
What was the reason?
Granny style didn’t look “cool”
Why couldn’t he just do the normal shooting style that 99% of the league was doing
lol why was it so extreme “Shaq you either continue your shitty form, or need to adopt the granny style”
That’s what he did tho, that’s his natural shot
Not necessarily, teams fouled him on purpose a lot of times, hence the whole hack a Shaq thing
They wouldn’t be doing that if he was actually hitting them
And if they didn’t do that, he’d dunk on their heads
Most of the fouls against him weren’t hack a Shaq though
Or even just average at free throws
And in a game the teams had 95 points.
Fuckin makes no sense. In this era a statline like that would only occur in a 140 pt game lmao
i love the feeling of vindication after battling OKC fans about the difference in foul baiting between eras last month
Lol yea. But best thing to do is avoid those battles. Online nba discourse is cooked especially considering most people online are super young and society is dumber now. People would have to be dumb to think other eras had foul baiting like we have seen the past decade.
This was basically Brunson in game 5 of the finals this year
I found brunson more akin to MJ g6 in 98.
Kobe was just too efficient in a low scoring game to be compared to tbh Brunson and MJ looked similar. Both 45 points in low scoring games with little other stats
Shaq probably made 10 of them
He in fact made 7 of them
He’s cold blooded… whoooo that young man can play basketball !
If you never saw this version of Kobe play you will never understand why players rate him so high.
nah kobe is not even a top 50 player and got carried by shaq. and pau gasol should have won fmvp. also i eat paint and all my.bball knowledge from reddit.
Had me in the first half, not gonna lie
No one has ever said he’s not top 50. Stop trying to play victim
ahh yes the glorious straw man. Nobody claims Kobe wasn’t incredible. Its mainly the casuals that think Kobe was Jordan/Lebron level when he wasn’t. Its extremely reasonable to have kobe anywhere from 9-13 all time
The thing is there’s very little actually separating these Top 10ish players, so the idea Kobe is on their level isn’t really wrong from a basketball standpoint. We saw Kobe/LeBron in the same league for years and Kobe was getting best in the world talk until he started declining (around 2011 and 12)
Accolades, sure they beat him, but no one will say Shaq wasn’t on Kareem’s level because Kareem won more MVPs etc
Yeah the main thing was everytime Kobe and Lebron went head to head before he declined, Kobe just seemed like the best player in the world
That dunk was nasty
Panic attack is a strong phrase for that lol. Incredible commentary though, crushed it. Essentially who I thought Gus Johnson would become but never did.
Because doubling Kobe was pointless, he’d still get to his spot and score.
Why tf they not doubling when hes already 18-24?
Still must’ve thought it was a fluke & got cocky
man, everything really was better back when
I know its easy to have rose colored glasses, but this era of basketball was fucking terrible.
i’ve been rewatching some games from 2000s and seeing mo williams take a pullup midrange shot in transition made me want to pour bleach into my eyes
evrything i see makes me think that the 90s were the peak of this modern society sht
His shot was so damn pretty
That jumper is pure as fuck. Doesn’t even look like it had that much arc yet it went all net
That Rockets logo is beautiful
I love Kobe and Shaq, but I hated the Lakers in the 2000s. They were so good and so dominant, not many stood a chance.
2nd greatest hooper of all time and most skilled.
Footage grainy is fuck but I still saw that clear travel. Big yikes.
Peak Mamba 👀💯
Guess its fuck the rockets day
I forgot Kobe had hair
Not to take anything from Kobe but that defensive coverage in that situation is crazy. No double, no help, and you sag off him and give him an open jumpers.
Sagging didn’t really create the space for the jumper, the space was created by a very effective jab and fake to the right.
Hard doubling is pretty impractical in this scenario. Unlike modern players getting trapped for example, Kobe doesn’t call for a ball screen that would bring a second defender to him.
The Lakers also clearly designed this play to clear out space for him. The fake DHO leads to a strong cut that the defender has to respect dragging them down to the paint. Kobe’s positioning at very top of the key also makes it difficult to double as he’d have a ton of space to punish that decision. Shaq is threatening to dive in front of the rim, meaning the Blazers also need to keep two players near him if possible.
The remaining defender actually is in a help position and actively steps up once Kobe makes his move. This help deters Kobe from trying to get to the FT line or all the way to the rim. He just drains a 20 footer regardless
I think the guy guarding Harper (?) can and should’ve trapped. Most likely not an elite shooter and if he makes a play, then so be it.
But likely the team didn’t have a defensive plan coming down the floor.
Players have become so much better at contesting shots nowadays. That would be considered a wide open pull-up in today’s game. Back then it’s a cold blooded unguardable shot.
Not to take anything away from Kobe but the game has changed a lot.
The defender was all over Kobe at the start of the possession, but Kobe did one jab step dribble and which gave him 1 foot of open space and that was enough space to drill the shot. Very nice footwork by Kobe to open up space for the shot
Yeah it was a good move by Kobe but today a simple jab step isn’t giving you two feet of space on a guard. Maybe a on a big man but guards/wings should have quicker feet than that.
Today that would be a jab step followed by a step back to gain the extra foot of space. The jab wouldn’t be enough
Edit: also want to add the defender was not all over Kobe at all. It was bad defense. No crowding of the air space, no physicality on the catch or for positioning, not even a hand on the hip (ahem handchecking?), gets shaken 3 feet off balance from a jab step.
So you actually think jab steps no longer work in the NBA and all defenders can tell when it’s a jab vs when the player is actually going there? Offensive moves no longer matter because defenders can just sus out exactly what the offensive player is doing before they do it.
No I’m not saying jab steps don’t work. They still do, they’re still an important move in a players arsenal. I’m saying that one move doesn’t shake a defender anymore. It takes 3, 4, even 5 mini-moves to create the space for a jumper. Watch a SGA, Brunson, or Luka isolation and see how many little moves they have to make to get a clean look.
Each move has slowly decreased in effectiveness due to defender’s improved ability to recover and contest shots, but that has morphed into players being able to combo multiple moves in one isolation.
The only guy in today’s league who can jab step straight to a jumper is KD bc he can just shoot over everyone.
I’m not dissing Kobe, I’m highlighting the progression of both offensive and defensive basketball over the past 2 decades.
That’s a lot of words to say you don’t think a jab step works anymore. Highlighted by when you say it takes 3,4 or even 5 moves to create the space for a jumper. Maybe players in the league today just aren’t as good at it as Kobe was.
jabs do work, they’re just followed by more moves to compound the space needed for a clean look.
Also you know how I know defenders simply weren’t as good at guarding a jabstep back then? Simply watch Kobe 2003-on. He’s also compounding moves upon moves to create space. Idk when it exactly was, but the Iverson mixtape revolution caught on later than this clip and inspired players to increase their bag. This in turn challenged defenders to keep up with each individual move until they couldn’t.
Then as more individual moves were “invented” such as the step back, euro step, step through, etc, defenders improved on their ability to guard them and those same moves became part of larger packages of moves instead of single moves.
A single jab step isn’t enough to shake a defender anymore. The defense on Kobe in this clip is absolute cheeks, Kobe didn’t do anything special here. Also, I hope you figure out how to read some day.
Kobe was a masterful with his footwork. Like Brunson is now. The first step is everything, which is why the defender reacts the way he does. When you get blown by 10x a game, it takes 1 jab to get a foot of space.
Are we watching the same clip? That wasn’t some explosive first step, the defender was just ass.
Maybe one of the first people I’ve seen say that today’s defenders are better. I’m not disagreeing with you it’s just neat.
I’m not just a “present is better than past” guy. For instance, lack of post play today is criminal given how big and skilled our centers are. Way too much leeway in the rules today make it easier for offenses. Too many 3s taken by mid shooters. And ofc tanking.
All that being said, perimeter defense stunk back then and I’m tired of ppl saying they played more defense. I implore ppl to watch one playoff game from 2000 and one from this year and note the difference in perimeter physicality 94ft. It’s staggering.
Bro, you literally just answered your own question. ‘lack of post play today is criminal’ - yeah, that’s because it’s a perimeter based game now, there is more value in defending and shooting from that range than down low, so naturally players are going to put more effort into perfecting that part of their game than something they will use much less often. ‘perimeter defense stunk back then’ - again, that is purely due to the nature of the game they played. It was still a big man’s game (most notably because Shaq was the most dominant force, along with guys like Duncan) so that is where the game and mindset is going to be concentrated ie where the majority of the game is played. Skill isn’t an unlimited resource, it is limited by time. If you want to be exceptional at one aspect of the game it will almost always come at the expense of other aspects of the game simply because you cannot devote your entire damn life to practising basketball. Players need to eat, sleep and enjoy their lives in ways that don’t involve putting up reps in a gym. My point is, however the game is played in any particular era is where the highest skill levels will be concentrated.
Lmao
They were doubling Shaq in the paint, hard to blame them for that.
Now defense are willing to give the middy jumper as the team go down to shoot the 3.
Slipping all over the floor, biting on every fake, late getting back on defense… man this defense gives me secondhand embarrassment.
Yep, poor defense and defensive schemes in that era. Watching the Finals from the 2000’s is rough. Players running into 4 guys in the paint and getting stuffed, terrible dribbling resulting in easy steals, etc. Counting stats from that era should be somehow adjusted to match today’s numbers.