Kobe Bryant's career now seems complete, at least to a degree. He's got scoring titles, he's got his "own championship," and he's locked his place in history as the "greatest player of his era" (I'm firmly on board with Tim Varner's notion that he and LeBron James belong in different time zones, if you will.) And since Mamba got a title sans Diesel, he's been remarkably enjoyable -- and honest -- in the public eye. His appearance with Conan O'Brien was excellent, and now, via a sneak peek of his upcoming interview with the FOX Business Network, FanHouse found out that this honesty policy won't be changing; Kobe's candid discussion of Shaquille O'Neal and Michael Jackson are on tap for this evening.
Bryant's discussion about the King of Pop wasn't surprising: he's previously mentioned that MJ influenced his career, but he emphasized with FOX just how much Jackson's work ethic influenced him.
"I think that what people don't know about Michael was the amount of time he put into bringing so much joy to people all over the world," Bryant said. "I mean, it wasn't like, you know, he'd wake up one night and think of 'Billie Jean' and go in the studio and it's voila. I mean, he put in a lot of time, man. A lot of sacrifices were made for him to bring so much joy to so many people around the world."
It seems like somewhat of a cliche, I suppose, but it's true -- and while Bryant might not be bringing "joy" to people "all over the world" he at least made millions of
"It wasn't even whether or not I could win one without him. It's people saying that I can't win one without him. And I use that as fuel, as motivation to push me and push me until we eventually won it."
See that world? I knew it! Okay, that doesn't make me smarter than anyone else, because everyone knew it, no matter what Kobe said about the situation and whether we actually thought he would ever admit it ... but he did. And it turns out that his legacy was always going to be affected by whether or not he won the title without Shaq, even if it didn't matter because of the greatness he produced on the court this year. And frankly, it's kind of enjoyable to hear him finally admit it.
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