SPORTS

Be sure to check out these other sports stories:

True Ballas post first ‘W’ in 5-on-5 Basketball
GHC student featured in NASCAR fan documentary

 

 

Stephanie McCombs, Columnist

Real Talk
By Stephanie McCombs
[email protected]
Columnist


Kobe’s not a one-man team

Kobe this, Kobe that. Who cares about Kobe Bryant? So what if he scored 81 points against the Toronto Raptors! Play a team worth playing--Miami Heat, Detroit Pistons or the San Antonio Spurs--and see if he gets 81 points then.

When he was taking all those shots, where were his other four teammates, on the bench? Oh no, they were on the floor. He just hardly ever uses them.

As Charles Barkley says, “He’s a ball hog!”  And I totally agree. Don’t get me wrong, brother has mad game and can play, but he has to learn to use his teammates as well. Learn to have faith in someone else besides himself.

Bryant should know by now he can’t win the game alone. He needs help. He can score as many points as he wants, but nine times out of 10, that’s not going to get the job done.

When you look back on the Lakers’ season last year, the first thing that comes to mind is, “They didn’t even make the playoffs.”

Also that was their first year without “The Diesel,” Shaquille O’Neal. You would think, being that Bryant has the team the way he wants it, to himself, he would see that he can’t do it alone. But obviously it hasn’t sunk into his thick head.

I think in order for the Lakers to get back on track, Bryant will have to learn to use his teammates more often and know that it’s not a one-man game.

Yeah, he’s better than the team as a whole and as of right now he leads the league in scoring, but he needs to make his game a notch better by making his teammates better, as in passing the ball and setting up plays for them, etc.

Bryant’s assisting average as of right now is 4.3, not high at all. He hardly lets go of the ball unless he’s attempting a shot, or two or three.

On Jan. 29 the Lakers played the Pistons. Bryant had 39 and the Lakers still lost, 93-102. Feb. 1, the Lakers played the Indiana Pacers and lost 79-105. Bryant had 26 points.

Honestly, I don’t care how many points he scores or how good Kobe is, he can’t win a game or a NBA title by himself. He needs help. The Lakers haven’t been the same since the big man left, O’Neal.

Bryant, if you want to see the playoffs this season, son, you got to make some changes.