Getty Image
Michael Jordan, in many NBA fans’ minds (including mine), will always be The GOAT when it comes to basketball. His Airness is the measuring stick for greatness. His ridiculous competitiveness coupled with the results of that drive is what every NBA player going forward should try to achieve.
One player who certainly approached the game with the same intensity and passion, and gave MJ a serious run for his money when it comes to greatness, was Kobe Bryant.
Which is why, not only did the Los Angeles Lakers retire his jersey on Monday night, they actually retired both of them.
A perfect example of The Mamba’s mentality was recently revealed in a video recently shared by the folks over at Lakers Nation.
In this uncensored video, we get to see how Kobe Bryant relentlessly talked trash at Lakers practice giving us a glimpse at, just like MJ before him, how insanely competitive Bryant was, going all the way back to when he was just 17-years-old demolishing players from UCLA in pickup games.
As you will see in the video from the 2014-15 season below, when Kobe Bryant says participation trophies are “trophies for nothing,” he means it.
Poor Jeremy Lin… he never saw The Mamba coming. Luckily for him, he wasn’t the only one.