Kobe Bryant burnished his legacy as a no-holds-barred competitor when he was asked about Jimmy Butler on the new Barstool podcast, The Corp, hosted by Dan Katz and Alex Rodriguez.
Around the 31:49 mark of the episode, which they dropped along with every other episode in the first season on Wednesday, Kobe is asked about Butler's confrontational, expletive-filled first practice with the Timberwolves in preseason after a trade demand a few days before training camp opened (Butler later told Rachel Nichols he expressed a wish to be dealt months earlier to coach Tom Thibodeau).
"I think most of my teams would just call it a Monday," Kobe joked (but not really) when Katz asked him if Butler's practice was something Kobe would do. "They'd just call it a Monday; It's just a regular practice," he added amid the laughter.
The parallels with Kobe are obvious, especially in lieu of the obscenity-laced spiels he went on in practice towards the end of his career. Katz even mentioned the MJ parallels (good job buttering up your interview subject man!), and Bean did once call Jordan for advice after making one his teammates cry in practice.
"Practices are meant to be competitive," Bryant said a minute later in the pod. "They're meant to be competitive. If your practices aren't more competitive than the games themselves, you're doing the wrong thing. And most of these teams and coaches have gotten into a mindset of resting players: 'Oh, it's too much. We're not gonna practice. Light day, light day, light day.' Phil [Jackson, Kobe's coach for most of his career in L.A.] never gave us a light day. There's no days off. You show up and you work. And practices are worse. They're going to be physical; There's going to be more trash talking, and I'm gonna let you know. If you didn't show up today, I'm gonna let you know. It's gonna be embarrassing, and you're gonna hate it. But when Game 7 rolls around in the NBA Finals, you will be prepared."
The only Game 7 Kobe ever played in a Finals, in 2010 against the visiting Celtics, he shot 6-of-24 from the field. Most NBA analysts outside the L.A. sports bubble contend Bryant's Lakers only defeated the Celtics that night because Boston was missing Kendrick Perkins (back when that mattered), and Metta World Peace hit a big 3-pointer with a minute left.
Katz and A-Rod talked to Bean about a host of other topics as well, including how he handles a triple-team, which Katz tweeted about on Thursday.
