Did you ever think you would read this about Kobe this season? Dwight Howard had 19 points and 18 rebounds, Antawn Jamison added 19 points, and the Lakers survived Bryant’s bizarre FOUR-point performance for their eighth victory in 11 games, 91-85 over the Suns on Tuesday night.
Kobe had one of the worst games of his career last night, so what did the Black Mamba have to say about it afterwards? He spoke with reporters and then later took to Twitter to talk about it. Find out what he had to say after the jump…
*Tweet above in gallery*
According to ESPN:
Just when the Los Angeles Lakers thought their season was fully saturated with weirdness, Kobe Bryant made one shot and committed eight turnovers in one of the worst games of his career — and the Lakers still beat Phoenix.
Even in this tumultuous season jam-packed with statistical oddities and high-profile failures, the Lakers’ latest victory is a curiosity. Returning from a seven-game road trip, the Lakers hung on to win despite the fifth-leading scorer in NBA history, who had never played this many minutes (36) with just one field goal in his 17-season career.
Bryant didn’t attempt a shot in the first half and scored his first basket with 2:13 to play, finishing 1-for-8 in his lowest-scoring game since Jan. 13, 2005, when he left a game against Cleveland after six minutes with an injury.
Yet after the win, he greeted his horrific statistics with a smile.
“I thought it was great, actually,” Bryant said. “Obviously, scoring four points, going 1-for-8, that’s not necessarily a recipe for success. … But it’s not about us as individuals. It’s about what we can do to help the team.”
Bryant counteracted his nine assists — just one in the second half — with a raft of turnovers, yet the Lakers survived against one of the NBA’s worst teams with big plays from Howard, Steve Nash and Metta World Peace, who scored 17 points. Bryant finally got an 8-foot leaner to fall, keeping the Lakers in control.
“I’ve been doing that since January, when I was trying to make the right play, keep everybody involved, and then I try to get going a little bit,” Bryant said. “But they took away my post-ups to see if the other guys could beat us, or maybe if I’d get frustrated or force things a little bit, but I just took the double-teams and just tried to make the right play.”
