AI-generated q&a format analysis of the interview
Explore Kobe Bryant's insights on greatness, hard work, storytelling, and legacy in this inspiring interview. Discover lessons on resilience, love, and inspiring others.
Published January 26, 2024
This q&a format was automatically generated by AI from the interview. The analysis provides structured insights extracted from the conversation.
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SPEAKER_02: I think the definition of greatness is to inspire the people next to you. I think that’s what greatness is or should be. It’s not something that lives and dies with one person. It’s how can you inspire a person to then in turn inspire another person that then inspires another person. And that’s how you create something that I think lasts forever.
SPEAKER_02: That’s funny. I had a lot of them. My parents were great. Growing up, they instilled in me the importance of imagination, of curiosity, and understanding that, okay, if you want to accomplish something, I’m not just going to sit here and say, yes, you can do whatever you want. Yes, you can, but you have to also put in the work to get there. Right? So they taught me that at a really early age, man. And when you grow up as a kid thinking that the world is your oyster, all things are possible if you put in the work to do it, you know, you grow up having that fundamental belief.
SPEAKER_02: Both were influential at different points. Yeah. Right? My mom was there on a daily basis. My father was really influential at a really critical time where I had a summer where I played basketball when I was like 10 or 11 years old, and a very prominent summer league in Philadelphia called the Sunny Hill League. Where my father played, my uncle played, and they were like all-time greats and all such stuff. Yeah. Bo Chamberlain played in the league, you know, Earl of Pearl Monroe played in the league. And here I come playing, and I don’t score one point the entire summer.
SPEAKER_05: 11, 10, 11. SPEAKER_02: Because I was terrible.
SPEAKER_02: Because I was terrible.
SPEAKER_02: Awful. I mean, you know, and I had these big knee pads on because I was growing really fast, and I had socks all the way up here, and I had like the high top face. Skinny, yeah. Like skinny as hell. And I scored not a free throw, not a nothing, not a lucky shot, not a breakaway layup, zero points. And I remember crying about it, being upset about it, and my father just gave me a hug and said, hey, listen, whether you score zero or score 60, I’m going to love you no matter what.
SPEAKER_02: But to hell with that, I’m scoring 60. Let’s go. Right, right. And from there I just went to work. I just stayed with it, and I kept practicing, kept practicing, kept practicing.
SPEAKER_02: I think that’s when the idea of understanding a long-term view became important. Because I wasn’t going to catch these kids in a week. I wasn’t going to catch them in a year, right? So that’s when I sat down and said, okay, this is going to take some quality. What I want to work on first. All right, shooting. All right, let’s knock this out. Let’s focus on this half a year, six months, do nothing but shoot. All right, after that, all right, creating your own shot. And then you focus. So I started creating a menu of things.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I got my jump shot from 15, I got my three-point shot. Like just open shots, not miss open shots, right? Be able to shoot it with speed. Because those kids are so much more athletic. And then the next time I came back, it was a little bit better. And the summer came back. You scored. The next time I was a little better. I scored. It wasn’t much, but I scored.
SPEAKER_02: 12, 13. Then 14 came around, back half of 13, 14 years old. And then I was just killing everyone. And it happened in two years. And I wasn’t expecting it to happen in two years, but it did. Because what I had to do was work on the basics and the fundamentals. Well, they relied on their athleticism and their natural ability. And because I stick to the fundamentals, it just caught up to them. And then my body, you know, my knees stopped hurting. I grew into my frame. And then your athleticism, once you have the fundamentals.
SPEAKER_02: It’s game over. Then it was game over.
SPEAKER_02: I was good. I was good. And then about the end of my, like right when I was turning 14, I became the best player in the state.
SPEAKER_02: At 14.
SPEAKER_02: Of all ages.
SPEAKER_02: Like if you’re thinking about how often kids are playing. Right? And I’ll tell this to my daughter and my daughter’s team as well that I coach. It’s a simple thing of math. If you want to be a great player, if you play every single day, two, three hours. Every single day over the course of a year, how much better are you getting? Most kids will play maybe, you know, an hour and a half, two days a week.
SPEAKER_02: Do the math on that. For their season. It’s not going to get it done. It’s not going to get it done. Right? So if you’re obsessively training two, three hours every single day over a year, over two years.
SPEAKER_02: You make quantum leaps, man.
SPEAKER_05: I remember playing basketball. You see it. You get a lot better and you come back more confident playing on the playground with guys who used to beat you.
SPEAKER_02: And I’m like, really? Yeah, it’s not. It’s math. It’s it.
SPEAKER_02: Show up every single day. Do the work.
SPEAKER_05: There’s a beautiful story that I love from Jay Williams. I don’t know if you remember Jay Williams. Yeah. Where he did an interview a while back and he talked about how when he played you, I think the first time or one of the first times he played against you, he was like, I’m going to show up so early to the court to warm up and practice like before anyone. Yeah. And he shows up at the court. I don’t know if it was in L.A. or where I was. And you were the only one there already shooting free throws, already doing your fundamentals. And he goes, I’m going to stay here until Kobe leaves. And then he was like, gosh, an hour and a half, two hours later.
SPEAKER_02: I’m tired.
SPEAKER_05: Right. Something along those lines.
SPEAKER_02: I remember that.
SPEAKER_05: And I thought that was so powerful that you have this mindset, but how did you develop that? I don’t know if that’s what you call the Mamba mindset, but how did you develop that? And when did it start?
SPEAKER_02: And so you’re looking at me as if, okay, this kid’s soft. Right. He’s from the suburbs of Philadelphia. His father played in the NBA, played professionally. He’s got it easy. Got it easy. Born on second base, you know, all this other stuff. Right. And so it felt like they could try to be physical or try to intimidate me and do all this other stuff, which they couldn’t. Right. But now I’m saying, okay, well, you’re trying to attack me. How am I going to attack you? How can I mentally figure out ways to break you down? How can I show you that, no, I have the edge? Right. And so that’s when it first started for me is figuring out how to get the upper hand on an opponent that way. Right.
SPEAKER_02: Well, I mean, you know, like we used to have an all American camp that I used to go to. And, you know, at the time I first showed, I was a sophomore. And one of the things I would do is everybody would be at the cafeteria work, you know, eating and doing all sorts of stuff. I’d just go back to the gym. I’d just go back to the gym. They’d be resting, eating. And they’d see me leave. Right. But now you’re in a tough position because you’re like, okay, I want to be like, I’m following the kid to go work out. But I know he’s working. He’s up early and he’s doing all this other stuff. And so that was my way of showing them. Yeah. I may be on the suburbs, but you’re not going to outwork me.
SPEAKER_02: And I’m mentally going to be much tougher.
SPEAKER_02: I think it’s just figuring out ways to be better and to win the game. And it started as a defense mechanism because, you know, they were the ones talking trash to me and, you know, kid from Italy, blah, blah, blah, and all sorts of stuff. It was like, okay, I got to, I can’t let them, I got to defend myself here. Right. And then it became, okay, you know, I’m pretty witty. I can say some pretty witty things.
SPEAKER_04: And an Italian.
SPEAKER_05: It’s interesting. You know, I never, I never was physically gifted to an extreme level. I was always really good, but I was never like the fastest or biggest or strongest. But I remember my edge was, I’m not going to go party and I’m not going to drink alcohol. Right. So I’ve never been drunk still because I was like, I need every edge when guys were out partying late at night who were better than me and drinking and showing up hungover. I was like, I’m going to be more focused and have clearer vision. Right. And, but I wasn’t waking up at 4 a.m. like you, so.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah. And most people think it’s a simple thing, you know, passing the ball. You know, but that’s not how you make guys better. You have to really affect their behavior. How do you do that? So, you know, like I would tell guys, you know, we got to back to backs. You know, I don’t care if we’re in Miami. I don’t care if we’re in a great city of Chicago. We can’t go out. We got to get rest. Right. Back to back games. Back to back games. Right. Monday, Tuesday, you play Monday and play again Tuesday. Guys aren’t going to listen. Right. Right. So a few times I said, all right, we’ll all go out. We’ll go out together.
SPEAKER_02: I’ll drink with you. Right. But the next morning I’m banging on your door at five in the morning. Let’s go.
SPEAKER_02: Where are we going? I hung out with you. Now you come hang out with me. Wow. This is what we do. All right. Let’s go. And we’re at the gym. We’re working out. Right. We hit the bus. We go to practice. We play that night.
SPEAKER_02: And they’re dead. And they’re like, lesson learned. Really? Lesson learned.
SPEAKER_02: Listen, if you’re going to do that, do that. But don’t let that compromise what we’re here to do. Right. This is why we’re here. This is why you’re here in the first place.
SPEAKER_02: Right.
SPEAKER_02: That’s it. Work ethic. That’s it. So you got to show them, no, Kobe can do that and still has the energy to get up and do this. So either I got to meet that same energy or I got to keep my butt in my room.
SPEAKER_05: Yeah. Wow.
SPEAKER_05: What are some other ways that you can? And what do you think people can do in general with the business team or any sports team?
SPEAKER_02: And one of my favorite ones, Powell hates it every time I tell this story. He hates it. He hates it. But we lost to the Celtics in 08 and it was a physical series. I mean, they beat the crap out of us. Yeah. And so we go into the Olympic year that year. We wind up playing Spain for the gold medal match and we beat them. Uh huh. And so now we come back to start training camp and Powell shows up the first day of training camp. I had my gold medal hanging in his locker room.
SPEAKER_02: And he, I mean, like the one thing that he truly, truly loves is his country. Of course. And that is like everything to him. So it just drove him crazy. Oh, my gosh. I said, Powell, listen. He said, you’re an a**. I said, listen, Powell, you lost to the Celtics. You lost to us in a gold medal match. Let’s not make this three in a row this year.
SPEAKER_02: Let’s win this thing. And that was it for him. And he probably stepped up at a whole other level.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah. And then for him was just stepping up to a level of physicality. Yeah. That we needed him to get to, which he did. And we went on to win back-to-back championships.
SPEAKER_05: How important is understanding human psychology and human behavior to work with a team as opposed to just relying on your gifts and talents?
SPEAKER_02: You know, when you’re in this culture in our society, you can do some phenomenal things individually, but they’ll never reach their full potential unless you do them collectively. And you have to figure out how to do that. And, you know, Phil Jackson was great at that. Phil, you know, he wouldn’t just coach the team or coach the game, but he’d read everything about every single player. You learn about your history, how you grew up, how you were raised, where were you raised? You know, he’ll read every interview and he’ll learn about you and gives him a better understanding of what’s motivating you or what your insecurities are, right? And then it just helps him communicate with you better or even push a button here if he needs to.
SPEAKER_05: Was that in high school for you or more?
SPEAKER_02: There was a stretch in 03 where Shaq was out with an injury and Phil called me up to his office and said, okay, we need you to really turn on the afterburners and start scoring if we have to win. So I did and I wound up scoring, I think it was nine straight games with 40 plus points.
SPEAKER_02: Nine straight games. And then Shaq comes back, second to last game of that. And then Phil calls me up to his office and says, Cole, okay, I need you to dial it back. I’m like, why? Like we’re winning. I don’t understand. It’s because our goal is to win a championship. And we can get through the Western Conference with you playing this way. But in the East, you know, we can dominate them inside with Shaq in the post. But if you continue to do this, we’ll lose Shaq. We’ll lose him.
SPEAKER_02: Which triggers him. Right? So I need you to pull back so we can pull Shaq forward for June. Wow. And I just looked at him like, this is one smart dude. Wow. That’s really smart. That’s one smart dude, man. So I pulled the bag.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: The greatest challenge? I think it’s, you know, you won an Oscar.
SPEAKER_05: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: Like, you know, we were just talking about it here in the office the other day. You know, when you play the game, you hit a game-winning shot, you miss a shot. The reaction’s there. You can see how people are responding to it, right? You can feel it. The energy is there. The energy is there. What I do now, you don’t. Like, I don’t see how people are affected by deer basketball or, you know, creating the punies and you put it out there. Like, I wish I could see a car ride of a family the first time their daughter hears Lily’s Lemonade and what she’s doing, you know, she’s singing along to it. That’s not there, right? So that’s the challenge. That’s the one thing that I miss is being able to feed off of the energy.
SPEAKER_02: Yes, yes, yes. That’s the one thing. And when I went to, because I spent a lot of time with mentors as well up at Pixar and Disney Studios. They’ve been absolutely wonderful animation, Disney animation. And I’ve talked to them about Frozen and Moana and how our kids love them. And they’re always like, oh, that’s awesome. And they want to hear it because they don’t ever get a chance to truly see it. Like, they’re not- Not sitting in the movie theater like- No, no. And they don’t have time to go to Disneyland and walk around the park and see how many families are enjoying the content that they’ve created because they’re busy making the next one.
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
SPEAKER_05: So that’s the one thing. What do you think the biggest challenge is for most athletes after they retire?
SPEAKER_02: And that was certainly present for me as well.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: Well, it’s starting from scratch, right? Because when you play for 20 years, I play for 20 years, you reach a certain level. You’re like, okay, wait a minute. I have to start again at the base of a mountain and try to climb the top of this mountain. First of all, what mountain am I climbing? I don’t even know, like, what the hell am I going to be doing? It’s very scary.
SPEAKER_02: Even for you?
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely. And the thing that helped me actually was hurting my Achilles because that forced me to sit there and say, okay, the day could be today that your career is over.
SPEAKER_02: Now what do you do? You have these ideas about doing something with your life after basketball, but what if today is the day that you, that’s it. Now what do you do? So I had all this time sitting there with my Achilles injury and contemplating and thinking, and I said, I better get to work.
SPEAKER_05: That was that. What was the vision for you afterwards then? Was it to do what you’re doing now? Did you have other ideas or what is, what’s the vision?
SPEAKER_02: Was it more money thinking or money thinking saying, okay, athletes are saying you can’t make more revenue when you retire. This is your source of your income is here saying, okay, that’s a challenge. What can I do? And I remember just going for-
SPEAKER_02: I did. I did. And so I started, I went for a ride and I said, okay, stop thinking of it that way. You’re thinking of it the wrong way. Why’d you start playing basketball? Because I loved it. All right. What do you love to do? Oh, I love to tell stories. All right, let’s do that. And then that’s where it started for me. And then on top of that, it became things like, you know, you started learning more about the financial industry and about players going broke once they retire and saying, okay, how can I, how can I minimize the chances of that happening? What are things that I can do to invest my money smartly? I also helped control some of that outcome to a certain extent. Right. And that’s when I called Mike Rapoli. Mike Rapoli was an entrepreneur who built Vitamin Water and Pirates Booty and some other companies and started learning from them. And then from that came the opportunity to invest in body armor.
SPEAKER_02: And which, yeah, which we’re drinking now.
SPEAKER_02: But all that came from the injury and really having to self-assess and, you know, face that really dark room of what comes next.
SPEAKER_05: What’s a story over your life that’s been a constant theme that you go back to? Is there something you heard as a kid that you, that really resonates with you or a book or a movie that just feels like this is me?
SPEAKER_02: That’s funny. Movies, there are plenty, but there’s a quote from one of my English teachers at Little Marion named Mr. Fisk. He had a great quote that said, rest at the end, not in the middle. And that’s something I always live by. You know, I’m not going to rest. I’m going to keep on pushing now. There are a lot of answers that I don’t have. There are even questions that I don’t have, but I’m just going to keep going. I’m just going to keep going and I’ll figure these things out as you go, right? And you just continue to build that way. So I try to live by that all the time.
SPEAKER_05: Rest at the end.
SPEAKER_02: The question that eats me alive that I haven’t answered yet.
SPEAKER_02: I’m still looking for the answer. How to tell a good story. I don’t think anybody has that answer. You know, like when I sat down to write Dear Basketball, I was like, okay, what do I want to say? And, you know, you have certain acts in how you can structure certain things, right? The ebbs and flows of story. Certain formulas that have been there since the beginning of time. But it’s such an exact.
SPEAKER_02: Right. And so that one question is really interesting. Why do you want to tell a great story? I think stories is what moves the world. Whether it’s an inspirational story. It’s an informational one. Nothing in this world moves without story. You know, being from the political world, sports world, nothing that we have moves without story. And so I think that is the root of everything. And if we’re going to try to make the world a better place, the story is the right place to start. I agree. But most people don’t understand. Like my last year people would come up to me and say, okay, what are you going to do? I said, I’m going to be a storyteller. Really? And they go. They’re like, what are you talking about? All right, man. So what’s going to happen when you retire is you’re going to go through like a week of depression. Yeah. Then the second week is going to be like denial. Right. I’m like, dude, seriously, I’m good. So after a while I just got sick of it and I just said, I don’t know. I’ll go play golf or something.
SPEAKER_04: Just tell them a lie.
SPEAKER_02: I’m not going to do anything. I’ll mess with real estate. Whatever. I’m not going to do anything. I’m just going to sit around.
SPEAKER_05: It’s exciting.
SPEAKER_02: Because it means you have different ways to get better. There are certain things that you can figure out that you can take advantage of. Right. Certain weaknesses that were exposed that you need to shore up. Right. So it was exciting. I mean, it sucks to lose.
SPEAKER_02: But at the same time, there are answers there if you just look at them.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the answers are there when you win too. You just have to look at them. Right. So it’s a constant process. It’s exciting when you win. It’s exciting when you lose because the process should be exactly the same. Whether you win or you lose is you go back and you look and you find things that you could have done better. You find things that you’ve done well that worked. Figure out how did they work? Why did they work? How can you make them work again?
SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: That’s a really, really tough challenge.
SPEAKER_05: You mean look yourself in the mirror and say, okay, this is how I showed up or this is what happened?
SPEAKER_02: So Katie Lou Samuelson is one of the best college basketball players in the country. She plays at UConn. She’s going to be a senior. Right now. Right now. And she’s from Huntington Beach out here by us. And so she comes down and she works with some of my girls on the team and she helps coach. And they just had a really tough season last year where they lost to Notre Dame in the final.
SPEAKER_02: Really tough. First loss in like years, right? And so I asked her, I said, have you watched the Notre Dame game? She was like, no. I said, well, why not? I said, I don’t want to watch that. I said, I know you don’t, but you’re going to play Notre Dame this year. Yeah? Yeah. What’s the chances you see them again in the final? I said, well, you’ll probably see them again. I said, well, you can’t show up and play them without knowing why you lost that one. Right? So, you know, the mistakes that you’ve made in that game, you have to do the hard stuff and watch that game and study that game to not make those mistakes over and over again just because you weren’t brave enough to face it. So she came down to the office. I brought her down to the office and we sat down and we watched that game together.
SPEAKER_02: Right? You’ve got to deal with it. Face it. You’ve got to deal with it. Face it. Learn from it.
SPEAKER_05: It must have been cringing for her to just be like, oh, are you playing like we could have won all these things?
SPEAKER_02: If I just did that one thing.
SPEAKER_02: That’s exactly right. You look at it and say, oh, there’s the mismatch. Oh, there’s the gap. You know? And all those little things. And it sucks. But you don’t want to have that feeling again, do you? Right? So you’ve got to really study it. Face it. And not to say you’ll win the next time, but at least you’ll give yourself a better chance.
SPEAKER_05: Would you watch almost every game over or certain games?
SPEAKER_02: Every game.
SPEAKER_02: Every game.
SPEAKER_02: The whole game.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: And I call him Yoda. I mean, he was like 82 when he got here. Wow. And he was responsible for teaching me the triangle offense.
SPEAKER_02: I was 21.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah. So about my fourth year in the league.
SPEAKER_02: And so I go up to his room and this is when, there were no iPads or anything like that, right? So when you’re on the road. Yeah. You have to call down to the front desk and have to bring up the TV. Right. But the whole, you know, the rolly thing and the VHS and the cassette tape, you pop it in. And I thought we were going to watch what we call touches. So watch all your touches when you have the ball, all the decisions you make, good ones and bad. No, we’re watching the start of the game to the end of the game. And not like, not like the TV feed. We’re watching the in arena feed, the layup line, the timeouts.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah. Rewinding, stopping, fast forward, rewinding, slow motion, every little thing, every game of that season with the 82 year old Yoda.
SPEAKER_02: Who is as brutally honest as you can get.
SPEAKER_02: Oh, it taught me to look at detail.
SPEAKER_06: Hmm.
SPEAKER_02: Right. Look at things, things that they’re smallest. Right. Look at body language, you know, look at the energy between players, our team and the other team. Wow. Right. Look at the tactics, you know, look at the overall strategy and to look at how tactically things are manifesting themselves. And because I watched so much film, then it gave me the ability to see game in real time as if I was watching film.
SPEAKER_04: Wow.
SPEAKER_02: Cause a lot of times the game starts moving really fast. But if you train yourself to watch hours and hours of film, the game’s not moving that fast anymore. You can really recognize who’s doing what and why. Then you can position guys in the right places in real time.
SPEAKER_05: Seeing it before it happens.
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
SPEAKER_05: We, you know, in football, we’d watch it once a week, game film, but not, you know, after every game, it was only one game a week.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah. You gotta, you gotta go.
SPEAKER_05: Yep. I mean, watching his show that came out, Tom versus the time was all about him just in there studying. Mm-hmm. Even months after the game, he’s studying to prepare, right? It’s just like, he’s obsessive. And that’s, that’s one of the keys you think. It’s like, if you’re not watching film, whether it be as a speaker on stage or a performer and a musician, if you’re not watching yourself back.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, Beyonce’s the same thing.
SPEAKER_02: After a performance, she’s immediately on her laptop rewatching the performance.
SPEAKER_02: Yes. Seeing how to do things better. What could we have done differently? Right? I mean, it’s just, it’s an obsessiveness that comes along with it. You want things to be as perfect as they can be. Understanding that nothing is ever perfect. But the challenge is try to get them as perfect as they can be. Mm-hmm. And what can you do? It’s in your control. So control what you can. I can watch film all day long. It’s gonna help me.
SPEAKER_02: Yes. Yes.
SPEAKER_05: Or did you just encourage them? Or what was the…
SPEAKER_02: But what you can do is alter behavior and also change the vernacular of how they speak about the game. So on team buses, team planes, in a locker room, after practice, I would look at the film. I’d pull Powell, Lamar, Dee Fish, pull them aside and say, let’s look at this. Right?
SPEAKER_02: And then you speak to them in executional terms. It’s never, come on, guys, we can do better. Come on, guys, we can do better. That’s rah-rah stuff. Right? A leader must give very tactical, you know, things that we can do. Adjustments. Okay, the defense is doing this, that, and the other. That means we should probably do this, this, this, that, and the other. By midway through the season, through that behavior, you start seeing them communicating the same way back to you. Right? And it’s like, okay, Cole, they’re doing this, that, and the other to you. Maybe we should do this, that, and the other. You’re like, okay, yeah. Awesome. Great. Let’s do it. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_05: Are you still watching every game filmed as obsessively as the first 10 years?
SPEAKER_02: Well, when I was playing.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so when I was playing, what I would do is study the film, but study our younger players, and see what areas do they need to develop in, and how can I help them develop. I mean, that was the big challenge, is you move from, you know, being the single dominant player, to understanding, okay, I have to help these other guys.
SPEAKER_05: It’s tough. I mean, you were so dominant in your whole career, one of the greatest of all time. Was there a weakness that you had? Or did you, because obviously you were always trying to master your weaknesses so they became strengths, but did you, at the end, or towards the end, did you ever feel like, gosh, I still haven’t, like, mastered this one part of the game?
SPEAKER_02: Because you’re like, guys, let’s go. Get results. Shut up. Don’t complain, right? I don’t want to hear your whining. I don’t want to hear it. No excuses. Don’t tell me how rough the water is, just bring the boat in. You know, like, I don’t want to hear it, you know? And it’s, it’s understanding, like, okay, these guys have lives. Right. Outside of here.
SPEAKER_04: They have other things happening.
SPEAKER_02: They have other things happening to them that may be affecting the way that they’re practicing, or the way that they’re performing. Right. And it was hard for me to understand that, because nothing bothered me. You know, anything personally, you know, never fazed me when I played.
SPEAKER_02: Very well. So I couldn’t understand how my teammates couldn’t do that either. Until I, you know, so I had to really work on that aspect of it.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_05: Like, until the last, maybe, couple of years?
SPEAKER_02: I think about 09, things started changing for me. I started really making a conscious effort to better understand. And that doesn’t mean, I mean, you have compassion and empathy, so you go softer on them. It’s more like you put, you put yourself to the side, and you put yourself in their shoes, and understand what they’re feeling. And then, you have to make certain decisions of, okay, what buttons do I need to push for this player to get them to the next level? So it’s never, it’s not sit around and all, it’s all happy-go-lucky type of thing. Right. Your leader, your job is to get the best out of them. Even if, you know, they may not like it at that time.
SPEAKER_05: Wow. What are you most proud of from your 20 seasons?
SPEAKER_02: That’s what I’m most proud of.
SPEAKER_02: It was the hardest. You know, you’re playing with Rajon Rondo, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, and, you know, it was myself, Powell, and the players that other teams didn’t want. And, you know, how do we figure out as a group what to do? And the reason why I loved that series so much is that we went down three games to two against Boston. And now you got two games coming home. I remember sitting in the locker room, and they beat the crap out of us, too, that game. So we’re sitting in the locker room, and it’s really, really quiet. I’m sitting there looking around, and we just lost the Celtics in 08. So this is like revenge, right? And they’re kicking our butt again, right? So I sit around, and I just started laughing. I just started laughing. And then I remember Derek Fisher looked at me like, and Lamar looked at me. He goes, what is funny? I said, dude, they beat the crap out of us. They just beat the crap out. They said, I’m missing the part where that’s funny. I said, man, listen, if we start this season, and they say, you know, all you have to do is win two games at home, and you’re an NBA champ, would you take that? Yeah. Right. That’s all we got to do. Yeah. Go home, win two. We’re NBA champions. All we got to do is win two games in a row. That’s it. We’ll take care of the first game, and I promise you, they’re not winning game seven on our home floor. It’s not happening. Wow. So we all just laughed about it. And then we went out, and we figured it out. But that game seven was, we’re down 15 points in the fourth quarter. Right? And that’s when you have to collectively look at each other and say, you know, the spirit of your team must be good. Because at that moment is when teams fracture. If the energy amongst each other isn’t there, that trust isn’t there, you’re done. And we were able to collectively dig deep together and say, all right, we’re going to figure this thing out. Wow. And I wasn’t playing well. I wasn’t shooting the ball well at all. And so my teammates-
SPEAKER_04: Yes. Wow.
SPEAKER_05: I know it’s only probably like five to seven minutes left. I saw on Instagram that you’re up at like 4 a.m. lifting by yourself in the dark. And again, you’ve had one of the most incredible careers, arguably of all time. You know, made all the money in the world. Got a freaking Oscar now. You’ve got all these other things happening and yet you’re still waking up or at least you’re in the gym at 4 a.m. working out. And you just turned 40. Yeah. Right? Congratulations, by the way.
SPEAKER_04: Thank you.
SPEAKER_05: Why still wake up that early and train at this level in your life right now?
SPEAKER_02: Like when I first retired, let myself go a little bit.
SPEAKER_02: You got a little-
SPEAKER_02: It was awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, man.
SPEAKER_02: Well, as well, man. Bring it to me. Let’s go. Steak? Oh, let’s go. Milkshakes? Let’s do it. Yeah, man. Let’s do it.
SPEAKER_02: Oh. And it’s really hard because there’s no end goal. There’s no game. There’s no season. Right. So how do you motivate yourself to do it? How do you? How do you? And so for me, it was like, okay, I have to aim for something. So I said, I want to aim for size. I want to aim for bulk. Right? So that’s a tangible thing. I’m going to go for that. Right? But then also, it’s, you know, my children. Because like, you know, your kids can’t see how hard you work. You go to office. I come in the studio. They don’t really see the effort. Right? So how can we teach our children what it means to work hard? Well, you do it through training. Right? So when I get up in the morning, my daughter goes with me.
SPEAKER_02: 4 a.m. My 15-year-old goes with me. She goes with me before school. And it becomes a daddy-daughter thing.
SPEAKER_02: That’s cool. She just got a permit. Right? So she drives in the morning. It becomes a cool thing. Right? But through that process, she understands the value of hard work and things taking time. And the same thing with my 12-year-old. Right? She practices every day. Right? And so it’s through those behaviors is where I find the motivation to do it.
SPEAKER_02: Being with my family.
SPEAKER_02: That is, man, that is the most fun. It’s just, you know, it’s hanging out with them all summer. Being able to, like, do things that I ordinarily couldn’t do. Yeah. Because of training, because of season and stuff like that. Sure. So being around them and watching Bianca grow up. Because there are a lot of things that I miss with Natalia and Gianna because I was playing. So being there every day with them is so much fun, man. So it brings me the most joy.
SPEAKER_04: And what does love feel like for you?
SPEAKER_02: Happiness is such a, I think I would describe love as happiness. I think I’d describe it as a beautiful journey. You know, it has its ups and downs. Right? Whether it’s in marriage or whether it’s in a career. You know, things are never perfect. Yeah. But through love, you continue to persevere. And you move through them. You move through them. And then through that storm, beautiful sun emerges. Yeah. Right? And inevitably another storm comes. And guess what? You ride that one out too. Yeah. So I think love is a certain determination and persistence to go through the good times and the bad times with the someone or something that you truly love.
SPEAKER_05: Yeah. Which I started listening to. I’ve listened to the first two episodes. It’s incredible. They’re like 13 to 15 minutes episodic storytelling, you know, cartoons, I guess.
SPEAKER_02: For kids.
SPEAKER_05: It’s entertaining. There’s original music. There’s all these different characters. You’re teaching history like in a fun way. Yeah. Which I like the last one where it’s like, you know, we talk about history so we don’t repeat it.
SPEAKER_05: In our own lives. And then you teach lessons about overcoming failure for kids and insecurities and challenges we’re facing. And I think it’s beautiful. Can you talk about The Punies and the podcast and what it’s all about?
SPEAKER_02: So The Punies came to me from, you know, we have our family tradition. We watch The Sandlot every 4th of July. God, it’s the greatest movie in the summer. It’s the greatest. Oh my gosh. It’s the best thing. S’mores, baby. Dude, come on. Give me s’mores. So like that’s our family ritual. Oh my gosh. Every 4th of July. Sandlot. Sandlot. Right. And so after watching The Sandlot movie, I was like, we need a new sports movie like this. Right. So I started kind of concepting ideas and stuff. But nothing I truly loved. And then over Thanksgiving, our other ritual was to watch Charlie Brown. Uh huh. Right. The Pumpkin Patch. So we watched that and then I go, whoa, wait a minute. Let’s just put those together. Put those together. Right. And I already had written some stories, individual stories for Puny Pete and Bebe.
SPEAKER_02: Two of the characters and the Punies. And I said, well, let’s combine those. Let’s let’s. And then from that, that’s when The Punies started coming to fruition. And I started thinking about the characters and, you know, why does this show need to exist and where are some of the deeper messages that can be there that consciously you may not observe, but you can sense and feel. And that’s when I started constructing the show.
SPEAKER_05: Are you helping write the script? Are you helping put it all together?
SPEAKER_02: Uh huh. And has since grown into a position.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah. Greatest film school. And so he and I worked together hand in hand on outlining every single episode. So we outlined each episode, the story beats, and then we found a great writer named John Hollers, a great writer. And so we gave him the outline and he just made it a thousand times better. Wow. Um, and then I just, I directed each episode and.
SPEAKER_04: You, you, you.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I directed it. So, um, you know, the other challenge was finding great actors. Voice acting is a different skill. Yes. It’s a, it’s a challenging art form. Yeah. Yeah. You really have to be able to communicate a lot just through your voice. An essence and energy with your voice. Yeah. And so the trick was finding actors that have not lost that childlike quality. Right. They can still imagine themselves being children, being at the park and playing. Right. And once we found them, they really brought the characters to life. And now here we are with the punies, man.
SPEAKER_05: I want you guys to go download it right now. Subscribe. It’s the punies on Apple podcasts or Spotify and everything anywhere podcasts are at. I’m telling you guys, there’s a lot of parents who listen to this show. Download this, listen to it in your car and do me a favor. Take a video of your kids in the car and send it to me. Um, send it to me or tag me on Instagram, tag Kobe on Instagram.
SPEAKER_02: Kobe Bryant.
SPEAKER_05: Because that’s, what’s going to give you great feedback.
SPEAKER_02: That would be amazing.
SPEAKER_05: So put your phone again. Don’t, don’t film and drive. Do it. Have someone else filming it. Right. Um, but make sure you’ll put it on a GoPro and just press record.
SPEAKER_02: It’s about 15 minutes long.
SPEAKER_05: It is like this.
SPEAKER_02: Take them to the park too. Like on Saturday. Like we made them on Saturdays. Like every Saturday it’s a new episode because Saturday is normally the day us parents drive our kids to different sporting events. To the pool, to the games, to the park. Yes. Right. Cause that’s normally the drive. Yeah. Right. And sometimes it may be longer. And then that case you play multiple episodes, but that’s something you can listen to on your way to an event.
SPEAKER_05: It’s like little with original music and all that stuff. It’s really cool. Go download it again. Take a video and tag Kobe on Instagram. Are you on Instagram a lot yourself?
SPEAKER_02: Yeah. Tagging. Especially Lily’s Lemonade. Listen to Lily’s Lemonade. Yes. And I would love to see kids out there trying to do the Lily’s Lemonade song.
SPEAKER_05: Hopefully we’ll get a bunch of video clips for you. And your book is out in October. It’s called Mamba Mindset. Do you want to talk briefly about that?
SPEAKER_02: I’ve broken the book up into two sections. And process is really about the process of preparing, you know, through injury, recovery, studying of the game. And then the craft is the actual performance and the tactics. And so a lot of things that I learned through the game were through photos. You can look at a photo and see like a player making a move. Look at the angle of his feet. Look how he’s using his hands on defense. And I can really break down things to the smallest detail through that. And that’s what you’ll see in this book. I mean, it’s really a basketball Bible.
SPEAKER_05: Mamba Ment…
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah. You’ll see how I break things down. Like how I’m looking at things to the smallest of detail. Yeah. And that’s the best way to understand how to have that kind of mentality, is to ask questions and then find answers. And then that leads to more questions and you find more answers. And that’s what the book is.
SPEAKER_05: Make sure you guys get the book. You can pre-order it right now. Download the Punies. Follow you on social media. The final question is what’s your definition of greatness?
SPEAKER_02: I think that’s what greatness is or should be. It’s not something that lives and dies with one person. It’s how can you inspire a person to then in turn inspire another person that then inspires another person. And that’s how you create something that I think lasts forever. Yeah. And I think that’s our challenge as people is to figure out how our story can impact others and motivate them in a way to create their own greatness.
SPEAKER_05: You’re just a symbol of truth and inspiration to so many people.
SPEAKER_02: And I just appreciate you as a human.
SPEAKER_05: Appreciate it, brother. Thank you so much for watching this interview of Kobe Bryant. Again, he brought such a mentality to the game of basketball, but also he brought so much love to life. And it’s so incredible to see the stories, to hear the lessons of people who have been impacted by Kobe Bryant. I only got to meet Kobe once. We messaged a few times on social media, but I didn’t know him like most people. However, I got to experience him before and after this interview in a way that I found really inspiring and uplifting. I’ve done over 1,500 episodes on the School of Greatness, and you meet a lot of different people, people from all walks of life, people who have lots of money, lots of fame and success. And sometimes people don’t treat you the same way that Kobe does. And my experience was profound in the way that he was so busy the entire day. He had interview after interview all day, but he wanted to really take the time and ask me questions. What I’m going to do is share some bonus footage, about five minutes of never before seen video of Kobe interacting with me before and after this interview. We were able to restore this video. We were able to get the audio. The audio was never able to be used during the original interview, but with AI, we
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