Kobe, The New MVP: How Deserving Is He?

Poetic justice?  

PR appeasement? 

Call it whatever you will, Kobe Bryant finally gets his MVP trophy. Yes, that trophy!

Inarguably the most maligned and most feared player in recent NBA history, his game has pleased as much as it has shattered our expectations.

Yes, he has been the single most awesome force since Michael Jordan. Yes, he has been the most feared weapon in the NBA, the one whose mere presence shakes teams and defenses.

But also, he has been the most widely covered, the media has followed his every step, and also his every whisper. He dominates a good majority of your NBA discussions and he still gets the flak day in and out. Nothing is just good enough! 

Possibly, not since Jordan has any single player been so harassed and covered by the media, and the coaches, and the players.

It hasn't been easy, but Kobe's lived with it, for years. Even when they said that he was just too selfish for his team to prosper, he still played and won, and lost. 

Yes, Shaquille O'Neal might have never had those 3 titles if not for Phil Jackson. And again, if Kobe weren't Kobe, Shaq wouldn't be Shaq either. They were the perfect foils for one another, the perfect team.

Sad that they just couldn't get on in later years. But they are now friends, with a deep respect for one another-one climbing the stairs to salvation, and the other trying to find his way into the hallowed rooms he once inhabited. 

But then, for every door closed, another window opens. 

And it did. Kobe carried his team night in and out, shred defences and offenses apart, the records kept on piling, and still, his team was nothing without him. The Cavs without LeBron? Please.....without Kobe, the Lakers would just be another inner city ball club. 

And now, back to May 2008, with a red-hot Pau Gasol, a rejuvenated Lamar Odom, an inspirational Derek Fisher, a bench that threatens to be the best bench in the league, and his blink-and-you'll-miss-it leadership and game, Kobe's Lakers sit at the top of the Western  Conference, just an edge ahead of the red-hot New Orleans Hornets, and you would even be inclined to suggest that the last 10 games of the regular season just, just made the difference.....

LA won 8, and NO won 6, and of those four losses, one was to LA, another to Dallas, and again to the Spurs, and this is where it all faded away....Chris Paul could have plastered the MVP award those last games, but he cracked....and so did his team.

And remember, some of those road wins and losses for the Lakers and the Hornets respectively....just, just told you....that Kobe was the man. That Paul would improve in later years, but for now, Kobe was just irrepressible. 

Kobe's lived with this pressure all throughout his career, and the last few seasons, no one has had to deal with as much.

Yet, he plays and gives it his all, admonishes his team mates for not living upto their potential, for not giving it their all, takes over games and defences and just shreds them apart, and still gets so much dirt thrown at him that it's sometimes preposterous that he's still with the Lakers, still in the league. 

Paul and Kobe were my top 2 this year, not because KG and LeBron were any less deserving, but because Paul and Kobe were the main forces this year.

LeBron will, from now on, be the new Kobe, because he shares the same predicament-his team is just not good enough for his skills, his leadership.

This series against the league-leaders, the Celtics, will present LeBron his toughest test yet.

Chris Paul was amazing, the turnaround for his team absolutely mind-boggling, and those victories over some of the NBA's top teams, just wonderful. He did all he could, made his teammates All-Stars, rejuvenated some other's flagging careers, and hell, he even made his coach the Coach of the Year! 

But he wasn't Kobe....no one else was. Just ask any of the players or coaches in the NBA.....if they had to, they just wouldn't face Kobe. 

Kobe is the man you look out for, the one you search for in those four-five minute spans of the final quarters, the one who destroys a team before it even initiates its first possession in the opening quarter, the one who just looks at teams in the eye, licks his fingers and hands (and one sore finger too!), and just goes to work-doing what he now better than anyone else-score, assist, distribute, steal, block-and oh.....his team is now 5-0 in the playoffs, mind you!

Supposedly, the toughest Conference in years, right? Naah, his team was at the summit. 

A game or two was the difference between him and Paul, you'd think, right?

If the last 10 games had been different, Paul would be receiving the award, and you'd be saying, "Paul came good in those last games so he deserved it".....look at it another way, "Paul was awesome, but he was no Kobe". 

Kobe shed off those unforgivable losses to Charlotte and Memphis, two of the NBA's worst teams, and just continued to play, and inspire his team. They had one of the toughest end-schedules in the league, and they dominated.

New Orleans was torn apart to the tune of a deficit of 30, the Spurs manhandled on way to a crushing 20-point defeat, the same for Dallas, and at the forefront of it all....the man who egged his team to believing that something was real possible....Kobe.

Stats will never tell you the true story, because if they did, then, Kobe should have received his first trophy back in 2002-03 when the Lakers rode on his shoulders, in the absence of O'Neal, or in 2005-06 and 2006-07 when he had a stratospheric season when he towered over his team's wins...and their losses. 

He was the last warrior, the last samurai....he should have won it all then, but he didn't.

It's not about numbers, because Kobe Bryant is now way, way above that. It's just Kobe and KG now, they're beyond stats, beyond numbers-their impact and MVP-ness just plain apparent and understood in their team, the one their team looks up to....that's what a true MVP is.

That's what Kobe Bryant now is.

The debate will continue unabated, over the critics and the fans, but one thing is simple-the playoffs just got better, because Kobe Bryant and his team are The Team of the Moment, the ones you just can't get your eyes off of.

The team that shows you just how much they've grown this season, and has the results to show for it.

The perfect Hollywood ending? (not if Mr. James has his say)