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Originally Posted by kennethgriffin
...for his team winning. it becomes a legendary tale of bravery and heart, inspiration
kobe plays a few minutes seriously injured with 2 assists. gets made fun of for his team winning without him. people mock his heart, laugh at his bravery and give zero credit for inspiring his team mates
you people are class acts. dude shaved a full point off his average tonight just to try and help in any way he could |
I believe that Kobe did feel like he had to give it a go to show his team that he would do anything he could to play if it helped the team win, and setting the example was more important than anything he actually did in the game.
He will usually not talk about an injury as though not talking about it means he isn't injured. I guess he couldn't deny it since he had to leave the game.
I'm a Laker fan, first and foremost, but I have to give Kobe credit for his will and ability to play through pain. For Kobe, to a fault, there isn't THAT much difference between a regular season game and a playoff game in terms of playing through injury and pain. His team beat a very good Pacer team on the road (where the Lakers have sucked this year).
Impossible to say if Kobe giving it a go was an inspiration to his mates, but they did do what they were not expected to do.
I still don't think they're ready to advance past the first round as a 7th or 8th seed, but it's getting better. I'd like Kobe to take a few games off to let his team find more of their game without him, and to let his ankle heal a bit more properly, but I'm not sure they have that luxury and Kobe likely doesn't want to risk falling back out of the playoff picture. Moving up to the sixth seed would make their chances of advancing past the first round better, but the road to get there is no cake walk even the way they're playing lately (and still mediocre
at best against legit contenders, and even that is a stretch).
One game at a time, and this was a good team (what I truly care about) win on the road. I'll take it.