Kobe Bryant is almost amused by those who doubt that he will return from his recent knee injury to resemble the superstar player he has been all his career with the Los Angeles Lakers.
For the first time since suffering a fracture of the lateral tibial plateau in his left knee–only six games after returning from a torn Achilles–Bryant, 35, spoke on a number of issues:
* On the idea of sitting out the rest of the season, as some have suggested: “I think I feel more locked in now than I’ve been my entire career because of this,” Bryant said. “The spirits are fine, the focus is great. Just going to see what happens when I come back. … My philosophy on that kind of stuff is: Do your job. You owe it to the organization and your teammates to get ready as fast and as quickly as you possibly can and to come back as strong as you possibly can.”
* On whether the Achilles injury impacted the knee injury: “I don’t think one had anything to do with the other. We’ve evaluated it pretty extensively. The fact of the matter is any of us can get hurt at any moment and the key for us as an athlete is to block that fear out.”
* On watching from the bench: “When you have injuries that fear is enhanced and you kind of put yourself under the microscope a little bit and start thinking about it too much,” he said. “The reality is it can happen to anybody, so you have to be able to tune that noise out and just go out there and perform.”
* On what he learned in averaging 13.5 points in the six games before the knee injury: “I learned that I can pretty much do everything that I could before, particularly the last game [against Memphis]. The biggest part of my game, the last two to three years, has been getting to a space on the floor and being able to elevate and shoot pull-up jump shots and in the paint. It was a great test going up against Tony Allen, who in my opinion has been the guy that’s defended me the best since I’ve been in the league. So to go up against him on the fourth game in five nights, and respond to that challenge, felt pretty good.”
* On the doubters: “It’s the same old tune. It’s just being sung a little more loudly now. Those type of things just really help me lock in more than ever.”