Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neals former Lakers teammate Derek Fisher not too long ago recalled when issues began turning bitter between the dynamic duo.
Kobe was excellent throughout the Lakers’ championship run in 1999-00, however the next season he and Shaq have been nonetheless sharing the highlight.
Bryant didn’t find yourself being the Lakers’ main scorer in that 2000-01 season and Fisher says he was beginning to really feel below appreciated.
“We gained the primary title in 2000, and so I feel that second yr…in 2000-2001, that’s when it actually shifted just a little bit to I feel Kob actually felt like he was being requested to sacrifice just a little an excessive amount of when it comes to what — once more, it’s important to keep in mind, Kob actually noticed himself and in the end grew to become one of many G.O.A.T.s,” Fisher mentioned on Podcast P with Paul George. “Proper? And so not one of the guys on that listing have been the second man. I imply, when you actually go down the listing of men that we’ve the G.O.A.T. conversations about, I don’t know if there have been a lot of these guys, if any, have been the second man.
“And so I feel in ’01, Kob began to really feel like, ‘To ensure that me to be the G.O.A.T. that I do know I’m able to accessing — I’m prepared to place the time in. I’m willig’ to get up at 4 within the morning, no sleep, practice exhausting, play in each recreation, play by way of accidents, do the whole lot to change into one of many best gamers of all time. Why am I being requested to do much less and be much less when my teammate that’s able to simply as a lot or extra greatness isn’t perhaps investing that a lot time, power, etcetera?’
“And I feel that was the yr the place it modified just a little bit from wholesome — a few of the rigidity the good groups do want — to just a little bit extra like one man is perhaps standing in the best way of the opposite. And so for the remainder of us on the group, we simply all the time made certain that each guys understood, ‘We’re not selecting a facet, bro.’”
READ MORE: Shaq Says Dwight Howard ‘Lifeless to Him’ in Newest Chapter of Feud
