Kobe's Pitch To Dwight

[Dwight Howard]

Y! SPORTS

When Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant spoke to Dwight Howard on Tuesday, his words to the free-agent center resounded an unmistakable and unflinching message: Let me teach you how to be a champion.

"You need to learn how it's done first, and I can teach you here," Bryant told Howard during the Lakers' presentation, witnesses in the room described to Yahoo! Sports.

Bryant didn't come to Howard's recruitment meeting in Beverly Hills to appease him, but to challenge Howard to stay and embrace the burden of the franchise's culture and embrace Bryant's demanding disposition. Bryant invoked Michael Jordan's hard-driving ways as his blueprint, and how it pushed the Chicago Bulls to six titles.

Bryant, a five-time NBA champion, insisted he wouldn't retreat in pushing Howard every day, that as much as the Lakers needed Howard, Howard needed Bryant and the Lakers, too.

"You have to learn how it's done," Bryant told Howard, witnesses described. "I know how to do it and I've learned from the best – players who have won multiple times over and over."'

"Instead of trying to do things your way, just listen and learn and tweak it, so it fits you," Bryant told him.

Howard has retreated to Colorado for a few days, surrounded by representatives, to make a decision on his future. The Lakers are fighting frontrunner Houston, Dallas, Atlanta and Golden State to sign him.

At times in the 2012-13 season, Bryant and Howard clashed over decidedly different day-to-day approaches to the game. Away from the floor, Howard's lighthearted tomfoolery clashed with Bryant's relentlessly serious-minded way. Bryant is rehabilitating a torn Achilles, but is expected to be back early in the Lakers season.

Before the Lakers ever traded for Howard a year ago, each player had reservations about playing together, about how they would blend. As the Lakers struggled, the construction of a relationship was clearly strained, but there were times when they found common ground.

If this was goodbye between them on Tuesday, Bryant had gone out the way he had come into a relationship with Howard: telling him his basketball truths, his beliefs, his way.

"You have to learn how it's done," Bryant told Dwight Howard on the way out of the Lakers, or maybe the way back into them.

Only now, Dwight Howard gets the final word.

 

[GzUp]

 

[Dwight Howard]

sounds like an outtake from the Any Given Sunday script

 

[Tres Leches]

 

[FAH1223]

Sounds like Kobe but we all know he's talking to a Coward

 

[mbewane]

Yup he's gone

 

[Gravity]

Kobe is starting to read too much of his fan mail. When did he become a good leader

 

[Hahahaha]

How could he not stay after a speech like that.

 

[Dwight Howard]

Kobe is starting to read too much of his fan mail. When did he become a good leader

he leads by example.

 

[2Quik4UHoes]

Sounds just like some shyt he'd say, Kobe been bout it. My nikka was out here showing Shaq how to train and commit yourself like a leader and champion, so bout to make anyone think dwight will even comprehend those words. He's not even a player of that caliber.

Having d-hoe made me miss Shaq a lot this past year. He might of been a dikkhead for no reason other than his ego but when he was a Laker he represented. Him and Kobe were an all time great duo, d-hoe couldn't be either one of those nikkaz.

Kobe is starting to read too much of his fan mail. When did he become a good leader

When he won 2 rings without the so-called leader of the first 3. :troll2:

 

[OH SOHH TRILL]

in other words...

 

[Air Nikes N Hats]

Kobe might be right, but Dwight has to big of an ego. He is gone. The relationship with D'Antoni, the one with Kobe (combined with the fact he has stated hed like to play a few more seasons), and the fact that even with Dwight they wouldnt be with the elite in the West (S.A, OKC, Houston is on the come up)....

He's gone, and its probably best for both parties.

 

[BigE's Taper Fade]

Dwight should ask Kobe how well he taught Smush Parker to become a champion..

 

[Air Nikes N Hats]

in other words...

Pass To Kobe: Ron Artest Joking On The Lakers Offense - YouTube

:drose:


Priceless, and the delivery by Metta.....

 

[Gravity]

he leads by example.

I agree.