Shaq talks about Kobe in his new book

[SashAlex]

I really feel like Shaq has never played for Lakers before. And I'm a Laker fan since 98.

It's old and it is getting anoying. To me, he's lost that aura he had in the early 2000s a long time ago. They all behave like some little spoiled boys who're paid millions to play some basketball how the coaches say. Do these stories really surprise ya ? Their Ego is too damn high to be even surprised by all these soap-operas. Ask Kobe what he'd choose - just 1 title with him as a leader or 7 with him being behind, but for the team... The answer is obvious...

All many of us care, is LAKERS, Kobe or not Kobe, Gasol, Bynum, Shaq etc. etc. - to me, when they struggle, they're idiots and when winning gods.

While they care only about their egos, the egos that didn't allow them to be dominant and unstoppable for years.

In this soap-opera, Shaq has his big part as well as Kobe...

[rasta028]

http://lakers.ocregister.com/2011/10/31/new-shaq-book-tells-more-about-life-with-kobe/62163/

- So I’m on edge because I don’t have I don’t have a new deal, and Kobe is on edge because he might be going to jail, so we’re taking it out on each other. Just before the start of the ’03-’04 season the coach staff called us in and said, “No more public sparring or you’ll get fined.” … Phil was tired of it. Karl Malone and Gary Payton were sick of it. … So what happens? Immediately after that Kobe runs right out to Jim Gray and does this interview where he lets me have it. He said I was fat and out of shape. He said I was milking my toe injury for more time off, and the injury wasn’t even that serious. (Yeah, right. It only ended my damn career.) He said I was “lobbying for a contract extension when we have two Hall of Famers playing pretty much for free.” I’m sitting there watching this interview and I’m gonna explode. Hours earlier we had just promised our coach we’d stop. It was a truce broken. I let the guys know, “I’m going to kill him.”

Nothing really too new.


Now why in the world Shaq have Kobe's back after he threw Shaq under the bus telling the cops that Shaq paid his women to not talk.

- Kobe stands up and goes face-to-face with me and says, “You always said you’re my big brother, you’d do anything for me, and then this Colorado thing happens and you never even called me.” I did call him. … So here we are now, and we find out he really was hurt that we didn’t stand behind him. That was something new. I didn’t think he gave a rat’s ass about us either way. “Well, I thought you’d publicly support me, at least,” Kobe said. “You’re supposed to be my friend.” Brian Shaw chimed in with “Kobe, why would you think that? Shaq had all these parties and you never showed up for any of them. We invited you to dinner on the road and you didn’t come. Shaq invited you to his wedding and you weren’t there. Then you got married and didn’t invite any of us. And now you are in the middle of this problem, this sensitive situation, and now you want all of us to step up for you. We don’t even know you.” … Everyone was starting to calm down when I told Kobe, “If you ever say anything like what you said to Jim Gray ever again, I will kill you.” Kobe shrugged and said, “Whatever.” [...] From that day on, I was done dealing with Kobe. I was done dealing with Jim Gray, too. What goes around, comes around. When he got fired, he actually had the nerve to call me and ask me to help him out. What, did you lose Kobe’s number?

Brian Shaw part is quite interesting.

- He was so young and so immature in some ways, but I can tell you this: everything Kobe is doing now, he told me all the way back then he was going to do it. We were sitting on the bus once and he told me, “I’m going to be the number one scorer for the Lakers, I’m going to win five or six championships, and I’m going to be the best player in the game.” I was like, “Okay, whatever.” Then he looked me right in the eye and said, “I’m going to be the Will Smith of the NBA.”

- My first Lakers season we had a couple of rookies, and we hazed them pretty badly. We were dogging them out constantly. It was “Go get my bags, go get me something to eat.” It was kind of a rite of passage in the NBA that a lot of teams do, but we probably went a little too far with it. One of the rookies—Derek Fisher—just took it. The other rookie—Kobe Bryant—ratted us out to Jerry West.

[rasta028]

I find it hilarious how so many of you blame Shaq but not Kobe, he's the main reason the Lakers fell apart, Shaq played a big big part but Kobe hated that Shaq got all the love and the awards while Kobe was the boy wonder.

[dub81]

It's a autobiography..

If he did not put the stuff with Kobe in it the book is not going to sell.

So he's getting paid to snitch? Isn't that the worst of all snitches?

There is a big difference in snitching to the police that could get somebody in trouble with the law or there family than writing a book about his career.

[The_Trade_Seer]

I don't agree with the theory that had Kobe and Shaq "got alone better they would have won many more rings". Injuries were the only reason the Lakers didn't win 5 straight titles from 2000-2004, not chemistry.

Dr. Buss also made the right call in trading Shaq when he did and had Shaq stayed I do believe he and Kobe would have one more title ... without Shaq has won 3 conference titles and 2 nba championships.

[Kilroy]

It's a autobiography..

If he did not put the stuff with Kobe in it the book is not going to sell.

So he's getting paid to snitch? Isn't that the worst of all snitches?

There is a big difference in snitching to the police that could get somebody in trouble with the law or there family than writing a book about his career.

Only if you have an incredibly simplistic view of the situation... Or are predisposed to blame Kobe for something.

[Kilroy]

I don't agree with the theory that had Kobe and Shaq "got alone better they would have won many more rings". Injuries were the only reason the Lakers didn't win 5 straight titles from 2000-2004, not chemistry.

Dr. Buss also made the right call in trading Shaq when he did and had Shaq stayed I do believe he and Kobe would have one more title ... without Shaq has won 3 conference titles and 2 nba championships.

I don't buy it either... But it wasn't injuries, it was financial freedom.

We were cash strapped and unable to add talent for at least the last 2 years of the Shaq era.

If Shaq was committed to the team, I think we could have masked the fact a little bit more than we did, but as it was, we just didn't have a complete team and no depth.

[rasta028]

They didn't win more rings together cause Shaq had a weakness for cheeseburgers.