Happy Ending to Kobe Bryant's Career Hard to Imagine After Latest Setback
Father Time has a cruel, heart-rending way of reminding the world he's undefeated.
On the ninth anniversary of Kobe Bryant's 81-point romp against the Toronto Raptors, the Los Angeles Lakers announced the 36-year-old suffered a torn right rotator cuff that will sideline him indefinitely.
Soon after, ESPN Los Angeles' Ramona Shelburne brought word that Bryant is done for the season:
Already on a maintenance program and loosely enforced minutes cap, Bryant's latest setback doesn't just end his season—it threatens to damn any remaining chance he had at a happy ending.
There are no signs that this is a career-threatening injury. Bryant, as he did when he tore his Achilles, tried to shake this one off. With the Lakers trailing the New Orleans Pelicans by double digits on Wednesday, he returned in the fourth quarter, adamant that the unknown damage wasn't serious:
As Bleacher Report's Kevin Ding points out, this isn't an uncommon injury, either:
Still, whatever rehab is involved won't slow time. We know Bryant will work and work and work, monitoring everything right down to his diet. We just don't know what good this will do anymore after watching every effort to remain healthy and relevant be met by another roadblock.
From the vetoed Chris Paul trade, to a torn left Achilles, to Dwight Howard's departure, to a fractured lateral tibial plateau in 2013-14, Bryant's twilight has been put on life support more than once.
Now this, yet another injury for the once-durable, time-thwarting Bryant, who has spent all season watching the ground beneath him ruck and rumple. And that's the dispiriting part of all this—the familiarity of shrinking hope.
The process he has trusted, the craft he has honed and dominated for so long is betraying him. And as CBS Sports' Matt Moore writes, there is little, if anything, he can do to fight back:
"But the game is turning on him. He's a faded version of the hunter that used to stalk the court. If you squint at it, you can still see the snarling, brash, dominant figure that left players in awe. But you can't look at the numbers, or the diminished vertical and feel that this is the same. And with every injury, it gets harder. It's the energy that's the problem. Brett Favre spoke about this on ESPN radio recently, about how the struggle is convince yourself to go through all the work with diminishing returns.
Bryant's always loved the work. That's what he enjoys. Yet it's plain on his face and his comments that he's not just aware of the presence of The End, but he's felt it. He knows what it means, he knows it's near, and he knows it's inescapable.
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Not three years ago, Bryant would have scoffed at the idea of periodic rest that precluded him from trying to forestall Los Angeles' foray into the lottery. Surrounded by a placeholder-packed supporting cast, Bryant was on that maintenance program, trying to preserve body and mind as he and the franchise prepared for a more meaningful 2015-16.
All the while, when he's actually played, it hasn't been pretty.
Sure, there have been glimpses of greatness—going for a career-high 17 assists against LeBron James and the Cavaliers on national television, becoming the fourth player over 35 to score at least 44 points in a single game, grinding out a triple-double against Toronto as he became the first-ever player to amass 30,000 points and 6,000 assists in his career.
But those performances, while thrilling, merely provided temporary respite from reality.
Bryant is shooting a career-worst 37.3 percent from the field. His effective field-goal percentage (41.1)—which accounts for the difference in value of two- and three-pointers—will go down as the 13th worst in NBA history among players who have averaged at least 22 points per game.
Statistics have always portrayed Bryant in fickle lights, but this season is certainly not an accurate reflection of the player he's been for 15-plus years. It's difficult to imagine next season being any better, following yet another injury and knowing how 2014-15 has played out when he's been healthy or semi-healthy.
| With Bryant | 1207 | 100.4 | 24 | 112.6 | 30 | -12.2 | 30 |
| Without Bryant | 872 | 104.5 | 13 | 102.8 | 13 | 1.8 | 14 |
Playing on a drastically different Lakers team could help, but that's assuming the Lakers will actually look drastically different. Julius Randle's return is the only guarantee; everything else—including Randle's contributions—is up in the air.
Help will only come via the draft if pingpong balls bounce the Lakers' way. They own the Houston Rockets' low-end first-rounder, but theirs will be sent to the Phoenix Suns if it doesn't land inside the top five, per RealGM.
That would appear to be the silver lining of all this. The Lakers already have the league's fourth-worst record. Losing a key contributor like Bryant should, in theory, increase their chances of retaining that pick.
Which is what may happen in the end. But a top-five pick, whomever it is, won't transform the Lakers into ready-made contenders by next season. The numbers also show that Los Angeles has been significantly better without Bryant, so there's a chance, however slim, the team plays itself up the Western Conference ladder when he's on the shelf:
On-off splits can indeed be misleading. Minutes disparities and the difficulty of opposing lineups—playing against starters rather than second units—can skew sample sizes. Regardless of what the statistics say, many also won't subscribe to the notion that Los Angeles is better without an all-time great.
Whatever the end result of Bryant's absence, though, the Lakers will know soon enough.
And then they'll know how that absence affects their ability to improve before he's gone for good.
Hitting it big on draft day has never been the primary goal, after all. The Lakers' books are structured for maximum financial flexibility after this season, per HoopsHype. Nick Young, Ryan Kelly, Randle and Bryant are the only players under guaranteed contracts beyond 2014-15, leaving the Lakers with enough spending power to pursue the biggest names.
Bryant himself has already committed to recruiting at least one of the available superstars.
"No way," Bryant said when asked if he's done pitching Rajon Rondo now that the point guard plays for the Dallas Mavericks, via Steve Bulpett of the Boston Herald. "I'm not done. I'm not stopping until he signs an extension."
Although Bryant shares a special bond with Rondo—he has said they get along "extremely well," per CBS Sports' Ken Berger—one has to believe that, with his career clock ticking away, he'll try to sell others on Los Angeles as well.
So, the question becomes: What are Bryant and the Lakers selling?
Pitching the likes of Marc Gasol, Goran Dragic, Paul Millsap, Kevin Love, LaMarcus Aldridge and Rondo, among others, is hard enough following one of the worst seasons in franchise history. Bryant's injury additionally handicaps those meetings.
Recent performances probably won't instill much faith in Bryant's remaining abilities, and his absence kills any chance he had to prove otherwise on the back end of this season. And remember, it's not just Lakers lore, their penchant for winning and their propensity for taking care of superstars Bryant is hawking.
He has to sell free agents on himself, on what he has left, on the idea that next season can include purpose in part because of what he has left. The difficulty and, most importantly, legitimacy of that task has now been severely compromised again—just like it was when he tore his Achilles, saw Howard spurn Los Angeles for Houston and missed most of 2013-14.
Just like it was when this season, even before injury, saw him devolve into a fast-fading silhouette of the time-slighting player he used to be.
Never before has Bryant's plan to play on seemed more futile, or that sixth championship felt more out of reach.
Everything needed to go right for his remaining days to have meaning. Free agency, his health, his play—everything.
This latest setback suggests they won't, and it may portend something even worse.
Where the potential for career-concluding triumph once stood, there is instead the more powerful possibility that Bryant's final days will be spent not marching against time, but submitting to it, his shot at a sixth ring gone, his chance at a happy ending—mentally, physically or otherwise—now inconceivable.
*Stats courtesy of Basketball-Reference and NBA.com and are accurate as of games played Jan. 21, 2015 unless otherwise cited.
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