Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant earned a reputation as one of the most intense players in NBA history, but that didn’t stop Golden State Warriors star Stephen Curry from trying to get in Bryant’s head as a rookie.
Curry recently recalled something he said to Bryant down the stretch of a game years ago when the shooting guard was about to take some free throws. Curry’s efforts to throw Bryant off didn’t work.
“It was a game at home at Oracle, and they were winning, and I think they were up like six or something like that down the stretch, and we were starting to do the foul game,” Curry said. “And when he was going to the line, I just walked by and was like, ‘Yo, you nervous?’
“And the look he gave me was one I will just, is burned into my, like, ‘One, he’s a rookie talking to me, but two, am I nervous? What are you talking about?’
“I low-key expected him to do the [Michael] Jordan thing and walk up there and shoot them…eyes closed and then look at me, like, ‘[Dikembe] Mutombo, this is for you.’ I think that’s what Jordan said.
“But the look he gave me said it all. It was like, ‘Yo, you just got here. Relax.'”
Curry added that Bryant made the free throws. If that exchange really did come during Curry’s rookie campaign, then the trash-talk from the sharpshooter didn’t stop Bryant and the Lakers from winning a championship that season. Curry was a rookie in the 2009-10 campaign, and that season ended with Bryant’s Lakers winning their second consecutive title.
A few years later, Curry started to establish himself as a star at the NBA level, and it was around that time that Bryant started to decline. Bryant eventually retired following the 2015-16 season, at which point Curry had already become an NBA champion himself.
Bryant, a Hall of Famer, retired with five championships, two scoring titles and one MVP award. Curry, meanwhile, has earned four championships, two scoring titles and two MVP awards in his NBA career. He still has time to add to his resume and would certainly love nothing more than to get a fifth ring this coming season, which would tie him with Bryant.
Although Curry’s efforts to throw Bryant off his game all those years ago were unsuccessful, Curry at least gets to take that story with him for the rest of his life. The 37-year-old has been able to share the floor with a number of NBA greats during his time in the league, ranging from folks like Bryant to current Lakers star LeBron James.
Now, Curry himself is one of those greats, and he will eventually end up in the Hall of Fame once his playing career comes to an end.
