18 y/o Kobe Bryant tried to dupe Shaquille O’Neal with rehearsed raps on Lakers bus rides
Kobe Bryant wanted to fit in so badly that he rehearsed riffs and tried to freestyle Shaquille O’Neal and the Lakers.
Kobe Bryant had the utmost confidence in his ability to be one of the greats from the start. He was certainly heading in that direction by the time he stepped onto the NBA floor. He had the genes of his father, Joe Bryant, connections to players around the league, experience against players much older than him, and something about that purple and gold seemed to foster superstar talent.
However, Bryant’s confidence overcame his skills at times. He shot 4 straight airballs from beyond the arc in a playoff game his rookie season and walked off the floor with his head held high, knowing if he was given the chance again, he wouldn’t change what he did in the basketball court.
This is just one example of how Kobe Bryant dedicated himself to his life.
The first 8 years of his career were with the most dominant figure in the history of the NBA, who coincidentally had his best moment in those 8 years and this was not enough for Bean to give the status of “alpha dog” to Shaquille O’Neal.
An anecdote that perfectly describes an incipient rivalry between the two is one from ‘The Icons Club’.
Kobe Bryant practiced bars but claimed they were freestyles
Just like in school, the back of the bus was where the fun happened. For the 1996-97 Los Angeles Lakers, this was no different. Shaquille O’Neal and the rest of the Lakers would post in the back spouting rhymes with ‘The Big Aristotle’ doing most of the heavy lifting due to him having a platinum selling album in the mid-’90s called ‘Shaq Diesel’.
A young 18-year-old Kobe Bryant saw this and not only wanted to participate but also be the best of the bunch in freestyle. So, according to Jackie MacMullan in ‘The Icons Club,’ he went to work. He would spend his nights writing his bars and when the opportunity presented itself, Bryant left. By the time Kobe finished the riff on him, everyone in the Lakers knew he had rehearsed it before and made fun of him, with the Lower Merion alum making his case. “We would rap and he [Kobe] would come back with these big words and we’d look at him like, ‘That’s not freestyle.'”
This ‘event’ is a great microcosm of the relationship Kobe Bryant had with the rest of his Lakers brothers. Wanting to fit in, but ultimately isolating himself to work his craft, was how ‘The Black Mamba’ spent those 8 years in Los Angeles before becoming the undeniable leader of a back-to-back title-winning team.
