The "Shaq-Kobe beef" has become kind of a meme, just a flat cultural reference point. How to Make a Basket: Shaq vs. Kobe endeavors to go deeper than that, to figure out why and how these two legendary partners didn't get along, and how they achieved such greatness in spite of that.
Part 2 begins in 2000. After Shaq and Kobe won their first championship with the Lakers, it seemed like the feud between their two stars might be over. But while Shaq relished in finally reaching the mountaintop, Kobe was dissatisfied. He spent the whole summer working on his shot, hoping to become such an elite scorer that no one could deny him first-option status in the Laker offense. The Lakers kept winning, but Shaq didn't agree with Kobe's plan, and their conflicts in viewpoint inflamed the "work beef."
Part 2 begins in 2000. After Shaq and Kobe won their first championship with the Lakers, it seemed like the feud between their two stars might be over. But while Shaq relished in finally reaching the mountaintop, Kobe was dissatisfied. He spent the whole summer working on his shot, hoping to become such an elite scorer that no one could deny him first-option status in the Laker offense. The Lakers kept winning, but Shaq didn't agree with Kobe's plan, and their conflicts in viewpoint inflamed the "work beef."
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00:00 fried shrimp, melted cheese, mayonnaise, ketchup,
00:05 all on a roll.
00:08 This is a Shaq Daddy sandwich.
00:11 When he played in Orlando,
00:12 Shaquille O'Neal ordered this custom sandwich often enough
00:15 that a local restaurant put it on the menu.
00:18 On the night in 2000,
00:20 when he won his first championship with the LA Lakers,
00:23 Shaq couldn't sleep.
00:24 So his personal chef made him a Shaq Daddy at 5 a.m.
00:28 After finally getting some shut eye,
00:30 Shaq did a week or two of media appearances,
00:33 enjoyed the championship parade,
00:35 then headed to Vegas to do Vegas stuff with his friends.
00:39 After that, he went home to Orlando,
00:42 hunted a little, and hung out by the pool.
00:45 All this comes from one of several O'Neal autobiographies,
00:49 "Shaq Talks Back," published in early 2001.
00:52 Apparently, he also spent some time that off-season writing.
00:56 When he was ready, Shaq returned to LA
00:58 and signed a maximum salary contract extension
01:01 with the Lakers.
01:02 He joked he would spend all this new money
01:04 on Krispy Kreme donuts.
01:05 In reality, he got a new custom car
01:08 and a bunch of gifts for his teammates.
01:11 This hard-earned contract was the perfect capstone
01:14 to a well-deserved summer vacation,
01:16 the same way anyone would celebrate
01:19 the greatest achievement of their career.
01:21 Well, okay, almost anyone.
01:24 (gentle music)
01:27 If you want to get promoted to lead basket maker,
01:33 you've gotta spend your free time making some baskets.
01:36 Kobe Bryant's original plan for the summer of 2000
01:40 wasn't just to shoot all day, every day.
01:43 When Kobe declined an Olympic invitation,
01:46 he said it was because he intended to use that time
01:48 to marry his fiancee, Vanessa, go on a European honeymoon,
01:52 and visit the Italian pro basketball team
01:55 in which he and his family had invested.
01:57 But Kobe didn't get married that summer.
02:00 He and Vanessa pushed their wedding date
02:02 to the following year.
02:03 Kobe didn't maintain his commitment to the Italian team,
02:06 selling his entire share.
02:09 Instead, Kobe made baskets.
02:12 Now, 2,000 makes a day is an incredible number,
02:16 and some people questioned it, but that's Kobe.
02:19 The stories about Kobe's long, late hours
02:22 of intense training are innumerable.
02:25 They border on mythology.
02:27 Kobe's work ethic, though, was real,
02:29 and it was a clear difference between him and Shaq.
02:32 O'Neal admits he never shared Kobe's tunnel vision
02:36 on his practice, not to mention his metabolism.
02:38 Shaq wasn't a natural salad eater.
02:41 This comes from yet another autobiography.
02:44 Some of this discrepancy was just two guys
02:47 being different ages and at different places
02:49 in their personal lives, and some of it had to do
02:52 with their different basket-making techniques.
02:54 Kobe was working on shots from range,
02:57 runners, floaters, pull-ups, turnarounds,
03:00 fadeaways, finesse stuff.
03:02 Shaq was a masterful, close-range steamroller.
03:06 He didn't feel like anyone could stop his moves
03:09 toward the rim, so he didn't have much
03:11 to improve upon before each season.
03:14 He was pretty candid about this
03:15 in that landmark players-only conversation with Kobe.
03:19 - So I admit a lot of times I didn't come into camp ready,
03:21 'cause that's just how I got down,
03:22 'cause my thing is, I don't need to get ready for dunking.
03:25 - Especially not with Kobe doing his thing.
03:27 - Because I had you, I was able
03:30 to just chill out in the summer.
03:32 - They laughed about this in retirement, but...
03:35 - That's what pissed me off.
03:37 That was it right there.
03:38 That was...
03:39 - Years later, Kobe expressed, with hindsight,
03:43 his belief that those Lakers could have won
03:45 more than three titles if Shaq just trained harder.
03:49 It was the subject of the last little public tiff
03:52 between these guys, albeit one they immediately downplayed.
03:57 But back in 2000, that gap in preparation mattered.
04:01 It reignited the work beef.
04:03 Kobe's untimely injuries had relegated him
04:13 to sidekick status for important parts
04:16 of the first championship season,
04:18 the very beginning and the very end.
04:20 He was a heroic sidekick at times,
04:23 but almost always secondary to Shaq,
04:26 who was regular season and Finals MVP of 2000.
04:30 Looking ahead to 2001, Kobe was done with that.
04:34 He came into training camp insistent
04:37 that his summer of hard work of however many baskets
04:40 entitled him to a bigger role.
04:43 And early season circumstances left the Laker offense
04:46 ripe for such a coup.
04:48 Derek Fisher had been expected to take over
04:50 as lead guard of the Lakers' triangle offense,
04:53 the chief basketball distributor,
04:55 but he was sidelined following foot surgery.
04:57 Most everyone else let their conditioning slip a bit
05:00 while celebrating the championship.
05:03 Not Kobe.
05:03 Kobe was more prepared and more eager than everyone else,
05:07 and he got more touches with Fisher out.
05:10 His attempted takeover happened gradually at first,
05:13 possessions here and there in which he ignored Shaq
05:16 down low to take the shot himself.
05:18 Shaq didn't wait to voice his displeasure,
05:22 privately and publicly.
05:24 Shaq made his point on the court too.
05:27 Lakers coaches thought their center was,
05:29 through some combination of petulance and poor conditioning,
05:32 not running or defending with 100% effort.
05:35 This only emboldened Kobe.
05:38 On November 8th, 2000,
05:40 in a pretty bad loss to Tim Duncan in the Spurs,
05:43 Kobe set a new career high of 31 shot attempts,
05:47 hitting 15 of them.
05:48 Shaq only took 13 shots,
05:51 despite playing nearly the same minutes.
05:53 Again, Shaq bristled,
05:55 but here you could point to another variable,
05:58 Hacka Shaq.
06:00 More and more, when O'Neal got the ball
06:02 in a good scoring position,
06:04 teams would just foul him and put him on the free throw line.
06:07 More and more, Shaq missed those free throws.
06:10 Foul shooting had always been the big guy's weakness,
06:14 yet he had hardly worked to fill that hole in his game.
06:18 In fact, instead of refining his form with practice,
06:20 he'd kinda arbitrarily tweaked it,
06:22 evidently for the worse.
06:24 O'Neal admitted all of this in Shaq Talks Back,
06:27 with a little smiley face.
06:30 As long as Hacka Shaq remained a viable defense,
06:33 as long as Shaq wasn't gonna make those free baskets,
06:36 Kobe reasoned he shouldn't get the ball.
06:38 So, Kobe kept shooting.
06:40 2001 would be the first season in their careers
06:43 in which Kobe attempted more field goals than Shaq did.
06:47 Phil Jackson, once the savior of this rocky partnership,
06:50 had no grip on a healthy and motivated Kobe.
06:54 Phil told him to dial things down a bit.
06:56 Kobe said, "Nope, I'm dialing up."
06:59 This game at Golden State in December
07:01 stands out as exemplary.
07:03 Kobe made it a shootout between himself
07:06 and the Warriors' Antoine Jamison.
07:08 Down the stretch of what ended up being an overtime battle,
07:11 Kobe repeatedly ran pick and roll with Shaq,
07:15 and repeatedly ignored the roller to take the shot himself.
07:18 Reject the screen, beat Larry Hughes off the dribble,
07:23 shoot.
07:24 Take the handoff, dribble into the corner,
07:26 still contested, shoot.
07:28 During timeouts, an exasperated Shaq
07:31 demanded Kobe pass him the ball.
07:33 No.
07:34 Spin away from the pick, draw a second defender, shoot.
07:38 Not much of a screen, no separation,
07:41 doesn't matter, shoot.
07:43 That night, Kobe shot the ball 35 times,
07:47 and plenty of them went in.
07:48 He matched Jamison with 51 points,
07:51 the first 50-point game of his career.
07:53 Shaq took 18 shots, and the Lakers lost to the Warriors,
07:58 a pretty bad team.
08:00 No one was happy,
08:01 but Shaq and Kobe weren't gonna talk it out.
08:04 Kobe once explained that when things got tense,
08:09 he and Shaq didn't speak to each other
08:12 so much as they spoke about each other.
08:14 They used the media.
08:16 Reporters often had to pick one perspective or the other.
08:19 There were Shaq guys, and there were Kobe guys.
08:22 If you hung around one for quotes,
08:25 the other was likely to cut you off.
08:27 You got more regular work as a Shaq guy,
08:30 where Kobe's myth-making came from tight-lipped solitude,
08:34 Shaq built his own mythology
08:36 by talking and talking and talking.
08:38 He wrote books, he criticized, he boasted,
08:41 he teased and joshed and fibbed and backtracked
08:43 enough that you didn't know quite what to believe.
08:46 Did he wanna trade?
08:47 He reportedly told new GM Mitch Kupchak he did,
08:51 but then played coy with reporters
08:52 and let his agent deny it.
08:54 Did he consider heading back to Orlando
08:57 to play with Tracy McGrady?
08:58 He did say that, but then he denied saying it.
09:01 That entire book O'Neal released around this time,
09:04 "Shaq Talks Back," Shaq later said he never read it.
09:08 On a day-to-day basis, Shaq's loose words
09:12 were likeliest to stoke the perception of a feud,
09:15 but then he always reserved the option
09:17 to laugh at you for taking him seriously.
09:19 Shaq seemed to enjoy manipulating the media by being messy.
09:24 Kobe chose his words more carefully.
09:26 When he said something pointed, it was very pointy indeed.
09:30 There was no mistaking it.
09:32 It wouldn't be in the regular locker room scrum.
09:35 He'd pick a reporter for a separate one-on-one exclusive.
09:39 That 2000-2001 season, it was ESPN's Rick Buecher.
09:44 If the beef had been quietly defrosting
09:47 through the first few months of the season,
09:49 this January issue of ESPN Magazine
09:52 suddenly lit a grease fire, occupying the whole cover.
09:57 A solitary Kobe says he's second to nobody,
10:00 and yes, nobody includes Shaq.
10:02 Though not a direct quote,
10:05 that headline does not betray the text.
10:08 Buecher had filled a notebook
10:10 with spicy quotations and anecdotes.
10:13 This was where the world found out
10:15 Kobe told his coach he would not moderate his approach
10:18 to fit the team concept.
10:20 And maybe this wasn't the right team for him.
10:23 Kobe said he wasn't gonna take a backseat
10:25 like prior seasons.
10:27 He worked too hard and improved too much
10:29 to remain a sidekick.
10:31 Buecher was clearly becoming a Kobe guy,
10:33 but he got Shaq on the record too.
10:36 Shaq didn't like the new program.
10:38 He invoked the idea of the sidekick, the setup artist,
10:41 the magic and penny model.
10:43 Someone's gotta feed the big dog.
10:45 If the big dog's not fed,
10:47 he's just a token big man
10:48 screening and rolling for nothing.
10:50 Shaq basically threatened to withhold interior defense
10:54 if he didn't get the ball.
10:56 There had been rumors that he used hand signals
10:58 to discourage teammates from letting Kobe
11:00 dictate the offense.
11:02 Shaq was like, "If I am, they're not working."
11:05 "Well," explained Kobe,
11:07 "maybe the big dog would get fed if he hit his free throws."
11:10 Bryant couldn't trust Shaq or anyone else
11:13 as much as he trusted himself to lead the offense.
11:16 Yeah, the Lakers succeeded
11:17 back when the ball moved through Shaq,
11:19 but they were gonna succeed even harder now
11:21 with Kobe in charge.
11:23 Instead of five and seven game series,
11:26 they'd be sweeping their playoff opponents.
11:28 This article was incendiary enough
11:32 that Kobe warned teammates it was coming,
11:34 but the flame could not be unlit.
11:36 Now feeling rather chatty,
11:38 Kobe filled the papers with more tinder.
11:41 He didn't regret saying he trusted himself
11:43 more than teammates.
11:44 And regarding Shaq's nostalgia for the old program,
11:48 well, he may want that back, but it was time to evolve.
11:52 Responding through the New York Times,
11:54 Shaq basically said, "Fine, yeah, we did evolve."
11:57 "It's Kobe's team and look at it."
11:59 "Our record is worse and we're playing without passion."
12:02 "If you like it better this way,
12:03 "it could only be for selfish reasons."
12:06 Asked to respond to that,
12:08 Kobe told Shaq to focus on defense.
12:11 "Don't worry so much about scoring."
12:13 To which Shaq said, basically, "No."
12:17 "I'm not Dikembe Mutombo and I'm not Luke Longley."
12:20 "We are not an outside team.
12:22 "We're an inside-out team."
12:24 Let's talk about that.
12:26 Because all this bluster, all these catty little quotes
12:30 seem to revolve around one extremely basic disagreement.
12:34 Why did Shaq keep invoking the name of Luke Longley?
12:39 Well, when Phil Jackson coached
12:41 the Triangle offense in Chicago,
12:43 his best offensive player was Michael Jordan,
12:46 who would play guard or wing in most lineups.
12:49 Because Jordan was the biggest threat to score,
12:52 he got to hold the ball a lot
12:55 in basically any of these locations
12:57 and he got to decide what to do with it.
12:59 Guard him one-on-one and he would beat you.
13:02 Send a second defender and he might still beat you
13:06 or if he felt generous, he would move the ball
13:08 to one of these other bowls waiting nearby.
13:11 Luke Longley was one of those other bowls.
13:15 He was the center, the biggest guy in most lineups,
13:18 but on a team with MJ and Scottie Pippen and Tony Kukoc,
13:22 he didn't spend much time with the ball
13:24 dictating the offense.
13:27 Luke spaced the floor for Michael.
13:29 He set screens for Michael.
13:31 He stood over here and waited for Michael
13:35 to pass out of help or miss a shot he could rebound.
13:37 That kind of stuff.
13:39 In other words, Michael Jordan was the first option.
13:42 The most orthodox version of Phil and Tex Winter's offense
13:47 favored interior options.
13:49 If you've got Shaq instead of Luke Longley,
13:52 it makes sense to run those more traditional plays
13:55 that put the ball in the center's hands.
13:58 Make this pass and let Shaq go to work in the post.
14:01 He can beat this guy or both these guys
14:05 or kick it out to the open man.
14:09 The Shaq who won MVP did not just set screens,
14:13 rebound and defend.
14:14 He made decisions with the ball.
14:16 He was a traditional first option.
14:19 So all this big dog stuff was just Shaq
14:22 reasserting his claim on an offensive role.
14:25 Bring the ball up, throw it into me,
14:27 I'll make the plays from there, inside out.
14:30 He didn't hate Kobe, he needed Kobe,
14:33 like they were married.
14:35 Kobe saw it differently, especially in critical moments.
14:38 He wanted to create from the wing,
14:40 control the ball, make decisions,
14:42 not unlike what Michael used to do from his position.
14:45 Kobe's case came back to preparation.
14:49 If he passed to Shaq down low,
14:51 teams could negate any threat
14:53 by just intentionally putting him on the foul line.
14:55 Just like Shaq said, nothing personal,
14:59 they just went their separate ways.
15:02 Because you can be sure Shaq wasn't saying this stuff
15:05 to Kobe.
15:06 For a little while, he even stopped speaking to reporters.
15:09 His point had been made.
15:10 This is a pretty funny end to a long interview segment.
15:13 - We should point out that Shaq refused
15:15 to comment on the story.
15:17 - Only Kobe spoke to Jim Gray that day.
15:19 He suggested he understood Shaq's terms.
15:22 - I know what he wants.
15:24 I mean, I know that.
15:25 Oh yeah, I know how to get him into basket.
15:28 Oh, actually a little bit.
15:29 That's easy.
15:30 - And he acknowledged Shaq wasn't alone
15:32 in wanting to go back to the old way.
15:34 - When he says to you,
15:35 "It's gotta come through the big dog,"
15:38 or at least when he says that publicly,
15:39 does he say those same things to you?
15:41 - Uh-uh.
15:42 Uh-uh.
15:44 He doesn't.
15:46 Phil does.
15:48 - Indeed, Phil Jackson kinda threw up his hands
15:51 in a way that left the responsibility arrow
15:54 pointing in one direction.
15:56 - Kobe knew how we played last year.
15:59 He was like, "Shaq's not gonna change."
16:01 - Magic Johnson came in the Lakers locker room
16:04 before a game against the Cavaliers
16:06 and said something similar.
16:08 "One of you is gonna have to defer."
16:10 And he left it at that.
16:13 Kobe knew everyone meant him.
16:16 Again, we can't have the big fella be unhappy.
16:18 It probably wasn't a coincidence
16:21 that Bryant seemed more eager to feed the big dog
16:24 that night against Cleveland,
16:25 or that he notched his first career triple-double
16:28 a couple days later against Vancouver
16:30 while Shaq led the Lakers in scoring.
16:32 These were gestures in Shaq's direction,
16:36 but do not mistake this for an easy, pleasant adjustment.
16:39 Kobe had a lot going on at the time.
16:43 Off the court, he was juggling family issues.
16:46 His engagement and long-awaited April wedding to Vanessa
16:50 complicated his relationship with his parents and siblings.
16:54 Bad feelings led Kobe to cut those close relatives
16:58 out of his business dealings, and for a time, his life.
17:02 On the court, Kobe felt, to use Tex Winter's word,
17:06 discouraged.
17:07 Winter's wife thought Kobe seemed heartbroken.
17:09 After training so hard to become a great individual player,
17:14 here he was getting criticized from all angles for what?
17:18 Working?
17:19 His play, his willingness to tone down his scoring prowess
17:24 and keep the big guy happy vacillated night to night
17:27 with wildly mixed results.
17:30 Then, once again, health intervened,
17:33 perhaps at the right time.
17:35 Kobe had been bedeviled by little injuries all season,
17:38 and they added up.
17:40 Yet another ankle issue cost him a bunch of games
17:43 after the All-Star break,
17:44 chunks of February, March, and April.
17:47 Already isolated, already discouraged,
17:50 Kobe spent his downtime reflecting.
17:54 At some point, he spoke with Jerry West,
17:56 who had moved on to a new job in Memphis.
17:59 It helped to reconnect with the guy who made Kobe a Laker,
18:03 the guy who, as a Laker himself,
18:05 once adjusted his high-scoring game
18:08 to fit a domineering big man in Wilt Chamberlain.
18:11 With West in his ear, Kobe observed.
18:14 Kobe observed Phil disparaging him in the press,
18:18 jokes about Kobe while promoting his new book,
18:21 armchair psychoanalysis,
18:23 rumor-mongering about Kobe's past,
18:26 candid critiques about Kobe's resistance to the triangle,
18:29 and wanting to be Michael.
18:31 Kobe observed Derek Fisher
18:34 finally making his season debut,
18:36 manning the point guard spot, getting the ball moving.
18:39 Kobe observed Shaq quietly picking up his effort
18:42 and his preparation.
18:44 Magic saw it too.
18:45 Shaq took some responsibility,
18:47 worked on some stuff, defended,
18:49 didn't miss quite as many free throws.
18:51 Whatever it was that moved Kobe,
18:54 everyone agreed that by the time he returned
18:56 to the lineup for good, he was different.
18:59 He talked to his teammates, opened up,
19:01 didn't just block out the world
19:03 with his headphones like before.
19:05 He tried to fit in, not be the next Michael.
19:08 The media commended this.
19:11 So did Phil.
19:12 So did Shaq.
19:14 The Lakers did it again.
19:18 They coalesced at the right time,
19:20 and as Kobe had predicted,
19:22 blazed through an almost perfect playoff run.
19:25 LA lost one game across four series
19:28 en route to a second consecutive NBA championship.
19:32 Kobe dazzled everyone with some otherworldly performances,
19:37 nights on which his hard work and creativity
19:40 made him an unguardable scorer.
19:42 During LA's obliteration of the rival Spurs
19:47 in the 2001 Western Conference Finals,
19:49 Shaq proclaimed that Kobe was his idol.
19:52 Everyone was like, "For real?"
19:54 Shaq said, "Yes, for real."
19:57 But, once again, Shaq led the way overall.
20:01 The succession of sweeps didn't look exactly
20:04 like what Kobe had envisioned
20:06 back when he said he trusted himself
20:08 more than his teammates.
20:09 Shaq was often the first option,
20:11 especially in the finals,
20:13 where he earned a second straight series MVP
20:16 after absolutely smushing the Sixers inside.
20:19 Immediately after winning his second ring,
20:23 Kobe sounded relieved,
20:25 not just to have won,
20:26 but to have found some inner peace
20:28 and some peace with Shaq.
20:29 - Well, I had so much going on
20:30 outside of the game of basketball
20:32 that people didn't know about,
20:33 and it just felt good to pull through,
20:35 pull through the season,
20:36 to come through with another championship.
20:38 It definitely feels good.
20:40 - How about Shaq?
20:42 What was his take on the detente?
20:45 After the second title,
20:46 O'Neal released an updated edition of Shaq Talks Back.
20:50 In this new chapter,
20:51 he took some blame for fueling the early season animosity
20:55 than going into a shell.
20:57 He also said Kobe would become the greatest player
21:00 in the history of the game.
21:01 He invited the Michael comparison,
21:03 predicted Kobe might soon overtake him.
21:06 But Shaq was still Shaq.
21:09 Why did things work out?
21:11 Why did the work beef resolve?
21:13 The big dog got fed.
21:15 Smiley face.
21:16 That is what it would take to keep this beef dormant.
21:20 And it mostly stayed that way
21:22 for a couple seasons to come.
21:24 In '01, '02, the relationship looked stronger than ever.
21:29 Shaq and Kobe each made shows of public support
21:32 when the other one was suspended.
21:34 Again, Kobe led the Lakers in the regular season
21:38 and registered some outstanding playoff performances.
21:41 But again, in the NBA finals,
21:43 Shaq was unmistakably the first option.
21:46 When it really counted, he made the baskets.
21:50 A third straight championship trophy for the Lakers.
21:53 A third straight finals MVP for Shaq.
21:56 It's all good.
21:57 Congrats, greatest.
21:59 Congrats, most dominant.
22:00 In '02, '03, Kobe seemed at peace with this push and pull,
22:05 with adjusting his game to suit Shaq's needs
22:09 and his wavering health after foot surgery.
22:11 He said he was a piece of the puzzle.
22:13 They won with him, they won with Shaq.
22:16 That was what mattered.
22:18 The individual stuff meant nothing without the wins.
22:21 Working like this would only become difficult
22:25 if the Lakers stopped winning.
22:27 He didn't ever wanna know how that felt.
22:29 LA had a fraught, distracted '03 season.
22:35 Shaq had his foot stuff.
22:36 Phil faced health issues of his own.
22:38 Shaq mourned the death of his grandfather.
22:41 Kobe still wasn't on speaking terms with his dad.
22:44 Both Shaq and Kobe had new babies at home.
22:47 The worn-down Lakers scrapped their way
22:49 to just 50 regular season wins.
22:52 And in the second round of the playoffs,
22:55 it finally happened.
22:56 After three straight championships
22:59 and 13 straight playoff series victories,
23:01 the Lakers were eliminated in the postseason.
23:04 The Spurs got 'em.
23:06 There it was, that feeling.
23:10 Shaq sounded apologetic, but optimistic.
23:14 Get some rest, get some new blood, start a new run.
23:19 Kobe sounded less sanguine.
23:21 He was beside himself.
23:23 The dreaded feeling was as bad as he imagined.
23:26 Foreign, he hated it.
23:28 Reflecting on this now toppled Lakers dynasty,
23:33 Kobe said, "Careers go by fast.
23:35 "You have to take every opportunity you get."
23:38 LA had just blown one such opportunity.
23:41 A month later, Kobe said he intended to opt out
23:45 of his contract after the '03-'04 season,
23:48 one year in the future.
23:50 Kobe Bryant, who had only ever played for the Lakers,
23:57 was going to explore his options.
23:59 (gentle music)
24:02 (gentle music)
24:04 (slurping)
24:07 (chime)