Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, a rivalry and this time, Kobe got LeBron, owned and embarrassed him. #Kobe #LeBron #Owned
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That’s Kobe Bryant and that’s LeBron James in 2007. This is right after LeBron took this Cavs team to the finals and got swept and right before the Lakers got Pau Gasol. This is a different time, but one thing that’s constant. This is a meeting of the 2 best players in the league. Yes this is in a Team USA scrimmage, but even a televised scrimmage can mean a whole lot. Given the right context, any game can mean a lot. That 2004 loss was such a big detriment to the USA basketball program that they changed the program and brought in the legendary Coach K and Jerry Colangelo. The 2008 team was named the “Redeem” Team. It was a big deal, So in 2007 USA had to qualify for the 2008 Olympics. And there was a scrimmage between two squads within the 2008 team. Now this team is absolutely stacked so there was a lot of star power on both sides. Teams were split and on Team White was LeBron and on Team Blue was Kobe. At that time, it was the start of the Kobe-LeBron rivalry, the competition for who was the best in the league. Kobe was 28, LeBron was 22. Kobe was coming off a season averaging 31.6 points and 5.4 assists, LeBron averaged 27.3 and 6. Kobe hadn’t won without Shaq yet and just as a curveball, Kobe was looking to get out of LA.

Just in 2006, the Lakers and Cavs had 2 games each decided by a point. And in both of those Kobe and LeBron were guarding each. Kobe game winner and a missed free throw by LeBron. A missed game winner by Kobe. That was the season Kobe averaged 35.4 points and scored 81...yeah. And then in 2007, more of the same duel. So safe to say, Bron and Kobe were going at each other and when they would meet on July 22nd 2007, nothing would be different. Kobe and LeBron would start the game matched up on each other. Kobe would bring on a level of cohesion through the way unique to Kobe. See the team would wake up around 8 for breakfast. And while the team’s eating together, here comes Kobe. Wade wanted to come early to get extra work in before team practice and so he started showing up at 5 AM too. Then Lebron and Bosh followed. Soon the whole team was practicing at that time. So the team came together off of work ethic, mamba mentality. Remember Kobe was the consensus best player in the NBA. The rest was the future trying to knock him off. This scrimmage was no different.

To give this game even more context, Kobe and LeBron were possibly involved in trade talks for each other. Of course this wouldn’t have happened because Kobe had a no-trade clause and he wasn’t going to Cleveland, but this was a weird time. The Lakers weren’t all that good. These were the Brown and Smush Parker days. And so Kobe had said he wanted out. The Cavs wanted to pair up LeBron and Kobe, basically, the Cavs were trying to play out 2K MyLeague fantasies.

The 4th quarter would come along and for the most part. White would be ahead with blue keeping track. And then the game comes down to the last 4 minutes. LeBron just can’t buy a shot. The Blue make their comeback down 7 with 3 minutes left spearheaded by Melo and Durant. And then it’s all Kobe. He hits this 3 over LeBron, then this falling away shot over LeBron. Like Kobe’s doing Kobe things, and Bron can’t do anything. Jason Kidd hits this breakaway layup and with 21 seconds left. With 6 seconds left, Team White had a chance and (show the clip). Kobe guarded Bron and made it into a tough shot that he wouldn’t convert. Everyone knew who the ball was going to, and Kobe called game.

We never got the finals matchup between Bron and Kobe, we never really got to see two championship level teams led by each player go at it. So maybe this was that one game. And I thought it would be cool to look at it and acknowledge the mamba mentality.