Kobe Bryant's Search to Rediscover Self Will Define Success or Failure of Season
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. — Here he is, having cracked the bone just below his knee as he pulled his shredded foot out of the basketball grave. And all that happened to his good leg.
Expectations are universally low as Kobe Bryant, 36, begins the controversial two-year, $48 million contract extension that makes him the highest-paid player in the game.
Bryant's Los Angeles Lakers are being pegged more often as the worst team in the Western Conference than they are being suggested as playoff qualifiers, much less a title threat.
And yet…
With more opportunity than ever for mediocrity to qualify as success, the truth about this being some sort of off-Broadway Kobe show is all a masquerade.
Bryant has set his bar so high that he'd better be great—or he'll be unacceptable.
It's not just the salary; it's all that he has said and done since 1996, and how often he has soared to unexpected heights.
No one asked him to score 81, but he did.
No one assumed he would win without Shaquille O'Neal, but he did.
Favorite or underdog, then or now, there is an expectation that he can amaze.
Especially when he shares how much this opportunity—just the squeak of the sneakers, the smell of the leather—means to him now.
"Can't say I haven't missed the game," he said Monday. "I've missed it so much."
He's tired and worn out and facing an uphill battle, though.
But he's been tired and worn out and faced an uphill battle many times before, on the court late in games, before putting forth a heck of a charge nonetheless, creating something to see, win or lose.
He has proved masterful at reinventing himself in subtle ways—dating all the way back to when he vacillated minute-by-minute between being Shaq's foil and feeder—while remaining the same guy people love or love to hate.
Bryant believes he's onto something good now with efficiency of both time and movement, anchoring his game in the post, using his heralded will to overachieve mentally instead of physically.
His smarts are what give him a chance still to be spectacular.
This is that moment: The signs are everywhere that it's pretty much over, that only fools would trust that some of the best is still yet to come.
But then…Peyton Manning, post-spinal surgery. The San Antonio Spurs, again and again.
The only chance the old and slow have is to be smarter and sharper. It's the only hope for meeting those lofty standards again.
And for the guy who has long studied video of not just every make or shot but every single touch, for the guy about whom it was always said that he could make better decisions to make the game easier for himself, therein lies the hope that Bryant still has something truly special.
No one has it forever. It might not ever be as good as Manning setting the new touchdown record. It's pretty likely the Spurs drop off even as the common refrain is now never, ever to bet against them.
Yet the thing about the greats is that they don't give up. They fundamentally try harder and longer than is acceptable in our society.
And as long as Bryant isn't giving up, as long as he is committed to figuring out a way to maintain his standards, don't be surprised.
On the eve of his 19th NBA season opener, with Dwight Howard and the Houston Rockets coming to town, Bryant is speaking of "the challenge of being able to see where we measure up, and see where I measure up physically."
A small smile creeps across his face. He drops it quickly but finishes the thought, saying: "The question marks are the things that are the most intriguing."
He's old, but he's healthy, motivated and challenged. There has been no protective sleeve over his bum right knee this preseason. He has felt spry enough to come out like a latter-day Ron Artest at each opening tip, flying around and trying to set an attacking defensive tone for his undermanned young team.
Perhaps he's going to try and fail. It has to happen at some point. He shot just 39.6 percent in his six exhibition games.
But fear of failure has never been an issue for Bryant. Just as we all have in watching him, he has enjoyed the show and dealt with the consequences later.
Byron Scott and O'Neal both called Bryant "Showboat" back on those 1996-97 Lakers, and they meant it both for good and for bad. That season ended with Bryant, 18, daring to take clutch shot after clutch shot in Utah, stunningly putting up air balls on five of his last six as the Lakers lost.
If he doesn't try—and fail in such flaming fashion—he doesn't learn unequivocally he needs to train better and harder to get stronger for a long NBA season…and a long NBA career.
Maybe he will fail in flaming fashion. Bryant's first shot of this preseason was an air ball, too.
But he finished exhibition play declaring himself "very well-balanced, physically" and concluding: "I felt like I could do anything I wanted."
Do not lower those standards for him. If he winds up getting more shots blocked than Carlos Boozer and can't guard any better than Steve Nash would've, so be it. Some will laugh and some will cry, because Kobe will have failed.
But at least he will have failed to be Kobe—as opposed to losing faith in himself and no longer shooting for the stars.
Trying and failing to be Kobe will be, bottom line, the most respectable, admirable way to lose it.
And it also happens to be the only way he might just be Kobe for another year or two.
Kevin Ding is an NBA senior writer for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter, @KevinDing.
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