RealGM

People tend to forget Kobe had a lot of GREAT individual performance throughout his career. After completing the MJ's challenge in NBA2k11 , I'm inspired to do one for Kobe.

So which one of these 10 games do you think it is his best performance in his entire career?

Notable nomination: Game winning shot against Phoenix Suns in OT in Game 4 to go up 3-1. He also shot 64% in that game along with 2 key plays (steal and circus shot) at the end to force OT. Also the game against Duncan's Spurs in WCF where he dropped 45pts and 10rebs in almost full 48mins played.
 
But my favorite is the "Climbing The Great Wall". Kobe played over 54mins that game while putting a memorable dunk over 7'6 Yao Ming.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNemKXW6YcM[/youtube]

You can try to do duplicate his performance in NBA2k11 and post your result with print-screen proof here if you want.

I think this might be better suited for the Laker board considering some people see a thread praising Kobe and they come in just to say something negative, leaving the kobe nutthuggers butthurt comign in to defend their boy, leading to a derailed thread.

On topic:

I think while all the games you mentioned are great performances, there are only 3 games that have a chance at this.

81 point game= his career high,just ridiculous. most amazing scoring performance ever- easy to pick this, but the other 2 games could give it a good run:

62 in 3- I watched both games, and he was in a similar zone both games , and i'm not a big fan of what ifs...but I think he could have cracked 90 the way he was going. The fact that he scored more than the eventual wc champion by himself in 3 quarters is just unbelievable.

65 vs portland- Great shooting performance, plus taking over a whole game in crunch time. His clutchness + ridiculous hot shooting was someting special to watch.


Then you have: the game he set the madison square garden record. 12 threes. 9 straight 3s againts utah. last game againts jordan.

Thats 7. Maybe the 40-8-8 game againts orlando, game 4 of finals vs indiana, and game 3 of 2001 western semis.

And that was without all the clutch games with game winners.

The bottomline is, Kobe has had the ablility to have big scoring games that is unseen since the time of wilt, and the only knock i could have on him is that most of these outragous games have been in the regular season. Still amazing though.

I've seen both his 81 and 63 scoring games, and really imho it's hard to choose between these two. On one hand you have the Toronto Raptors who were historically one of the worst defensive teams that season. 81 doesn't look so impressive anymore, but then you consider the Lakers were getting their asses whooped at half time so they NEEDED Kobe to go off to win that game. Then you have Kobe scoring 63 points through 3 frikkin quarters against a great Dallas team that has always made its mark in the playoffs. Though the Lakers didn't really need Kobe to go off, they were blowing them out, and of course 81 > 63, but it felt like Kobe was more in the zone against Dallas than against Toronto.

The Dallas and Toronto games would be great "challenges" since many gamers like to use one guy as the entire offense.

I wouldn't exactly call the 2007 Celtics "suffocating" on D...

Phoenix one is kinda hard to go with after his performance in Game 7 that series and the fact the refs gave him that chance at a game winner with a horrible jump ball call. Freeze this at 3:25 when Walton gets the jump ball call with his foot entirely out of bounds. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TE3tUy6UMY to set up the game winner.

For best performance, I'd have to go with a meaningful game. It would have to be playoff and preferably Finals. So maybe the Indy Finals game where he played well. I couldn't really pick Game 7 this year, if the team didn't pick things up for him we'd be considering it one of the worst chokes of all time.

I would put these in there too.

2000 NBA Finals Game 4. - The game where Shaq fouls out and Kobe leads Lakers.
2000 Western Conference FInals Game 7

2009 Finals game 1 was sick.

65 in portland just because of this shot

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_KOPjhYQS8[/youtube]

this thread will turn into hatefest there s no doubt about it...

but on the topic i have to go with utah vs 06-07 regular season game 15(which you dont have on your list).

utah had the best record in nba going into this game,kobe had a knee surgery off the season and everyone was talking about how he is slowing down&done(funny right that early )
he had a good first half with 22 points,then come third quarter he scored 9/9 fg 10/10 free throw 30 points finishing the game with 52 points,without missing single thing from field,while kirilenko and his 7 wingspan was guarding him

btw you are confusing his double ot game vs houston with another houston game he didnt posterize yao in that game here s the actual game;
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBW9gyvQFS8[/youtube]
same game yao had 35/15 and both of this guys missed 2 gw shots in that game.

and another game which you didnt have in your list is Denver 08 playoffs game 2.
he had 49/10(assists yeah ) with shooting of 18-27.

and another forgetten gem is game 4 vs utah in 09 playoffs he had only 38 points but that game was againist some amazing 1on1 and help defense,he was 14/17 at some point in fg s,see for yourselves;
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2JSj2YbfGU[/youtube]

here s my top ten;

1.Utah 52 game
2.Portland 65 game
3.Bobcats triple ot game
4.Sacramento game 4-01 playoffs
5.Mj s last game in La
6.Denver game 2
7.http://www.basketball-reference.com/box ... 10HOU.html (really underrated game even most of his fans dont know this game.)
8.Mavs game
9.San antonio game 1-01 playoffs
10.Utah game 4.

hm.boston game 7,yeah haters will deny it,they say he sucked but guess what everybody sucked in that game.i watched kobe in his entire career and that game 7 was the only time i thought 'well he s acting like human' he struggled he tried really really hard and he left the court with a smile.
if he hadnt try that hard im sure even if we won he wouldnt be that happy,coz he know in the end 'i did my best and helped the team win' like everyother game he played.

this are my fav performance by him.

On the list I would say the Kings game since it was the playoffs.

The 81 points game was historic, because it was the highest scoring game of the modern era and I presonally doubt it will be surpassed in the next 30 years.

Man I remember I got a ticket for drinking at Utah Game 4.

65 point game was a hella of a game. Lakers on 7 game losing streak, which tied phils career high. The lakers are down in the 4th once again and kobe makes (Please Use More Appropriate Word) tough 3 pointers like 3-4 times to get the game to ot and win. This game was like a video game where anything he put up went in.

I think you're missing some games.

*game against the Sonics where he set what was at the time the all time record for most 3s made in a game

*56 points through 3 quarters against Shane Battier.

Moved topic to Lakers board, where it probably should be (unless you want to start/restart it on the Generla NBA Board).

Correct me if I wrong but, Kobe making 12 3-pointers came against the Sonics, not the Kings. I swear it was the Sonics I remember watching that game.

But all time, gotta be 81 pt performance. That S*** was unreal!

EDIT: My bad, Vincent, you beat me to it. I knew that game was against the Sonics

Good collection, I vote 81.

i was at the rockets/lakers game when kobe scored 53 and yao had 35......insaneeee game...kobe is really goood, and yao is HUGE

They are also both above average basketball players.

Force OT FTW vs. Suns
Force OT FTW vs. Blazers 04 for home court advantage
62 in NY in 09 should be in there

As a fan of Kobe's I would really like to see him go after 20 assists for a month of Nov, then 10 steals for the month of Dec.

Some might say that would be selfish, but the thing is Kobe can do this in the context of the game and by doing these things could help the Lakers become more balanced. Kobe could be even more of a defensive captain and have a steal off with Artest, Fish & Barnes.

Can you imagine career highs of

81 4 quarters
62 in 3
55 in a half
22 assist
10 steals
18 reb (15 in the Finals game 7)
7 blocks
7 chips

WOWOWOWOWOWOWOW