Here’s the thing, too: James knows Bryant goes to great lengths to belittle his unwillingness to rise up in the final moments of his biggest games. Bryant has five titles to James’ none, and had to bail James out in the fourth quarter of the gold-medal game of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Now Kobe was within inches, screaming into James’ face, “Shoot the [expletive] ball!” And, still, LeBron’s instincts weren’t to take ball and deliver it down Bryant’s throat. Score on Kobe, win the game and tell him to go to hell. Bryant would respect that.
So would Michael Jordan. Magic Johnson. Larry Bird. LeBron James is different. He’s probably better than all of them, but nothing in his DNA demanded that he go after Bryant there, that he destroy him in that moment.
“Yeah, he was telling me to shoot it,” James said. “I wish I could have that one back.”
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news;_ylt=AgluK9odfe9xDNQwKFXQT4G8vLYF?slug=aw-wojnarowski_lebron_james_nba_allstar_022712
Why is Lebron so scared of shooting it? I think anybody in that situation would have shot it. it wouldn't even have been embarrassing if he would have air balled it.