"The Truth About Kobe Bryant and Crunch Time"

[So_Ill]

Bulls fan here

Man This Abbott guy just keeps on making an ass out of himself. First he said Derrick Rose isn't good, now he is saying this. This clown has gotten so much attention this week just from writing complete garbage.

[Pablo Escobar]

Bulls fan here

Man This Abbott guy just keeps on making an ass out of himself. First he said Derrick Rose isn't good, now he is saying this. This clown has gotten so much attention this week just from writing complete garbage.

lol Rose is getting hated on like Kobe on realgm and by the same dude lool Rose has made it to elite status and these haters can't accept it, to me he's the mvp no doubt!

[dockingsched]

Bulls fan here

Man This Abbott guy just keeps on making an ass out of himself. First he said Derrick Rose isn't good, now he is saying this. This clown has gotten so much attention this week just from writing complete garbage.

i actually read his d. rose stuff after reading the kobe stuff, this guy is has some hate. glad to see apologized for calling d. rose a terrible defender, even though it was half-assed.

[joelafan]

if i have to pick fs west or watch on espn i will pick fs west 10/10 even the game calling for espn sucks at best most of the time.

[Atmanne]

Deconstruction of Abbott's piece here: http://www.silverscreenandroll.com/2011 ... #storyjump

He spends over 2500 words trying to convince you that Kobe Bryant is a selfish ballhog who is not very successful in crunch time situations. Three years ago, he might have been right. He uses numbers that appear convincing, because he ignores any numbers that don't fit his argument. And he has the audacity at the end to say that any open mind is forced to acknowledge his argument based on the numbers. In the end, the piece is a much more accurate reflection of Henry Abbott than it is of Kobe Bryant.

Is Kobe the best clutch player in the league? It seems that he's certainly in the conversation, but that's all it is, a conversation. That conversation will continue to evolve. Based on the numbers that I've produced, I think I've shown that Kobe Bryant continues to evolve. The only thing not evolving is Abbott's opinion of Bryant.

As long as your mind is open to all that, it has to be closed to the idea that Henry Abbott is capable of objectivity towards Kobe Bryant.

Word.

[joelafan]

Deconstruction of Abbott's piece here: http://www.silverscreenandroll.com/2011 ... #storyjump

He spends over 2500 words trying to convince you that Kobe Bryant is a selfish ballhog who is not very successful in crunch time situations. Three years ago, he might have been right. He uses numbers that appear convincing, because he ignores any numbers that don't fit his argument. And he has the audacity at the end to say that any open mind is forced to acknowledge his argument based on the numbers. In the end, the piece is a much more accurate reflection of Henry Abbott than it is of Kobe Bryant.

Is Kobe the best clutch player in the league? It seems that he's certainly in the conversation, but that's all it is, a conversation. That conversation will continue to evolve. Based on the numbers that I've produced, I think I've shown that Kobe Bryant continues to evolve. The only thing not evolving is Abbott's opinion of Bryant.

As long as your mind is open to all that, it has to be closed to the idea that Henry Abbott is capable of objectivity towards Kobe Bryant.

Word.

Word.
Great article.

[semi-sentient]

The ones that are tough to swallow are the isolation 1-on-2 or 3 plays. And I'm just going to abstain from the discussion if anyone honestly thinks that hasn't been a real tendency of Kobe's throughout his career.

I think it's been a big time tendency, but not so much in the post-season. In the regular season there is no question Kobe is going to be taking lots of ill-advised shots (not saying he hasn't done it in the playoffs, but it's not nearly as bad), but in the past few years he's given others their moment to shine on the biggest of stages (Ariza, Fisher, and Artest off the top of my head).

It has to have some value, not to be blown off as some agenda-driven smear.

It doesn't have much value to me simply because of who it's coming from and the fact that all it does is point out the negative. I find this article as distasteful as the one that ElGee wrote where he asked if Kobe was really clutch or if he was a choker (really?) in closeout games -- all because he thought Malone's reputation was undeserved (which it probably is, but that's a dumb way to make a point and reeks of agenda). That can be done for just about any player. I get that he doesn't like the fact that Kobe's been the unanimous choice over the years by coaches, but he doesn't really offer any type of argument for who he thinks it should be if not Kobe, nor does he really know why the coaches/GM's voted the way they did. I'm pretty sure the coaches don't care about Kobe hitting game-winners (or missing them) in January or February, but I could be wrong. Maybe they really do care about lucky bank shots like the one he hit against the Heat.

I guess another part of it is that this article is just another version of many that I've read which base their arguments on the research done by 82games.com, and I generally have an issue with those results because they are incomplete (they are from 03-04 through part of the 08-09 season, I believe) and ignore the post-season which is a whole different beast and IMO should be analyzed separately since it's win or go home against the best teams.

[semi-sentient]

BTW, that was a very good article. I think my thoughts can be summarized with the following statements, particularly the bolded part:

Abbott today made the case that Kobe Bryant is not the king of crunch time, as so many have labeled him. His argument is not wrong. It's not right, either. It is simply flawed, in many ways both intentional and (hopefully) unintentional.

The writer hits on the same points that I've made time and time again -- they use a limited time frame that happens to coincide with Kobe's worst seasons, and once again, they ignore the playoffs entirely.

I also dug the following:

Instead, the data set used for his argument is just a wee bit out of date. Let me fill in the blanks. Since the beginning of 2009, Kobe Bryant is 11 for 22 in those same "big" shot situations. He's also got three assists in that time period, which is a higher ratio of assist to FGA ratio than LeBron James had in the initial study. Now its time for a shocking admission; over that same time period, Kobe is 0-4 in the playoffs. Notice, that little tid-bit of information could be used to refute my overall argument, and yet I still include it. Why? Because I'm trying to make this argument as un-biased a way as possible. Besides, even with those four misses, Kobe is shooting 50% in do or die situations over the past 2+ seasons. Gee, that paints a little different portrait, doesn't it?

You've gotta show both sides of the argument, otherwise you come off as a hater, which is what Abbott really struck me as after reading the article. I didn't dismiss it after reading the title. I went all the way through it and considered the data he was using, but it was very obvious what he was doing and that was to distort reality based on incomplete research and poor overall analysis.

Anyway, I feel like my twin wrote that article. I agree with just about every word. Great rebuttal.

[magic1fan]

sometimes i honestly feel sorry for kobe. no matter what he does it always seem as if someone with an agenda is trying to discredit him. yet some of these same people expect us to believe lebron is worth 60 wins to a team by himself.