Phil Jackson Book Compares Jordan and Kobe

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"Kobe was hell-bent on surpassing Jordan as the greatest player in the game. His obsession with Michael was striking," Jackson said. "When we played in Chicago that season, I orchestrated a meeting between the two stars, thinking that Michael might help shift Kobe's attitude toward selfless teamwork. After they shook hands, the first words out of Kobe's mouth were, 'You know I can kick your arse one on one.'"

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It's pretty easy to figure out who Jackson was referencing in the following passage: "In his mind he had it all figured out. His goal was to become the greatest basketball player of all time. And he was certain he knew what he had to do to get there. Why should he listen to anybody else? If he followed my advice and cut back his scoring, he'd fall short of his ultimate goal. How was I going to get through to this kid?" It wasn’t Jordan. As a young 20-something, Bryant told Lakers teammates he wanted to win 10 rings but was a "stubborn, hard-headed learner," Jackson wrote. Jackson threatened during one film session in the 1999-2000 season that a trade could be "gladly" worked out if Bryant didn't want to share the ball with his teammates. Another time, Jackson shot back when Bryant said he wanted to be captain of the team: "You can't be captain if nobody follows you," Jackson recalled saying.

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"Jordan was also more naturally inclined to let the game come to him and not overplay his hand, whereas Kobe tends to force the action, especially when the game isn't going his way. When his shot is off, Kobe will pound away relentlessly until his luck turns. Michael, on the other hand, would shift his attention to defense or passing or setting screens to help the team win the game."

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Much of the book, though, is about Bryant. How could it not be? Bryant has often been a polarizing figure in his 17-year career.
Jackson even talked about how the sexual-assault charges levied against Bryant in 2003 temporarily changed his outlook on the perennial All-Star.It "cracked open an old wound" because Jackson's daughter was the victim of an assault while on a date with an athlete in college. "Brooke expected me to get angry and make her feel protected. Instead I suppressed my rage — as I'd been conditioned to do during childhood by my parents … it left her feeling alone and unsupported. (In the end, after filing a report with the police, Brooke chose not to press charges.) "The Kobe incident triggered all my unprocessed anger and tainted my perception of him. ... It distorted my view of Kobe throughout the 2003-04 season. No matter what I did to extinguish it, the anger kept smoldering in the background."

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Bryant gradually evolved during the 2008-09 championship season, when the Lakers successfully retooled with a more finessed look with Pau Gasol instead of the brute force of the Shaquille O'Neal teams. If Bryant talked to teammates in his earlier Lakers years, it was usually, "Give me the damn ball," Jackson wrote. "But then Kobe started to shift. He embraced the team and his teammates, calling them up when we were on the road and inviting them out to dinner. It was as if the other players were now his partners, not his personal spear-carriers." Jackson recalled hugging Bryant after the championship-clinching victory in Orlando. "This was our moment of triumph, a moment of total reconciliation that had been seven years long in coming," Jackson said. "The look of pride and joy in Kobe's eyes made all the pain we'd endured in our journey together worth it."

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