Why We're Seeing the Beginning of the End of Kobe Bryant's NBA Career

It's been a very nice start to the 2011-12 season for Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant.

Even after the wrist injury he suffered during the preseason, Bryant has done what he's always done and that's overcome everything and exceed expectations.

But how much longer can Bryant keep it up?

Sadly, it's more likely that we are seeing the beginning of the end of what has been a tremendous NBA career.

Relax, Bryant isn't going anywhere anytime soon, but he's not going to play forever.

He's entering his 16th NBA season and while he's only 33 years old, he's got a lot of mileage on those legs of his.

Eventually he's going to start slowing down. It happens to everyone.

Bryant's made a career of playing through all the nagging injuries, but eventually there will come a point where those injuries will keep on nagging. He was completely healthy for the first time in a long while coming into this season and that didn't last very long.

He will put up numbers this season, no doubt. That's what we expect. But there will come a time where he doesn't.

The decline of Bryant has been prematurely written about plenty of times and while I'm not suggesting anything like that, I am suggesting that we could be witnessing the last couple of season's where we see Bryant as a true NBA superstar.

The human body can only take so much and Bryant has taken a pounding throughout his NBA career.

Playing at the level that Bryant has played at for the duration of his career isn't typically something we see people do for two decades.

Eventually even the great ones begin to wear down both mentally and physically.

So, enjoy Bryant playing at this level while you still can. This very well could be the beginning of the end.