Wow... talk about bias and a one-sided argument...
Which favorite player of yours did Kobe posterize ?
Come on now.. dont' be shy

wow. could you be anymore biased? convienient that you didnt have a single quote from when kobe pouted in the beginning of the season. that all stopped before training camp. and bynum missed 40+ nights while gasol has only been with the lakers since february(ten games of which he missed) and the lakers are still NUMBER 1 in one of the toughest conferences in sports history. you know why? because Kobe Bryant has been there leading the way for 82 games. Kobe does have pau but nash had marion and stoudamire, duncan had parker and manu and shaq had....KOBE. thats K-O-B-E-4-M-V-P

I'm sorry but you have a skewed view on Kobe. Yes he was selfish for many years. I can tell by reading this poor excuse of an editorial that you don't watch every game. You admittedly hate the guy. Please stop putting out you hate articles. A true writer would back up his opinions with solid facts. And you didn't do that. And if you would've done that, I guarantee that you would use stats to manipulate and distort the reality. I seriously hope you're not trying to pursue a career as a sports writer. Please don't. Yes we have the 1st amendment. But people like you fill the internet with garbage and it loses it's credibility.

The author of the article is a complete moron. What do Bryant's attitude towards women and his pre-season whining have to do with his merits for the MVP award? The award is based on a player's on-court performance during the regular season alone.

Bryant selfish and makes his teammates miserable? It's apparent that you have not even watched a single Lakers game all season. You're just making yourself look incredibly stupid.

As others have said ... this article is so full of venom and so lacking in fact as to be a joke. It's clear that the author has not actually followed the Lakers this year, and most his comments are pure speculation. Kobe has been committed to the Lakers and encouraging to his teammates (especially the younger ones) once the regular season started. If you actually watched the Lakers games, you would see that he has been very much the leader and almost a coach on the floor.

this article has without a doubt proved that you go ahead and write without gathering your facts first, but instead formulate your opinion first and then tailor/manipulate the truth to them. that's a logical fallacy you know?

"Later in the summer, he tore into...teammate Andrew Bynum"
-people need to get this straight. that "public" tirade was not meant to be public at all, except several deceptive teens secretly recorded kobe and then leeched off the public's curiosity to earn money for themselves. are you criticizing kobe for having a valid reason for wanting to play with kidd instead of bynum, and for speaking in what he believed was a private conversation? do you really think that no one else in the nba privately expresses their opinions about other players? not to mention, 99% of the public was in agreement with kobe's opinion about bynum. all bynum had was potential, and he had yet to show any flashes of what he could do this year. this is the same thing as jordan drafting kwame brown because of his obvious potential. potential can either be realized or not. in kwame's case it wasn't. in bynum's case, it's getting there, but we don't know yet. plus, did you ever think about why bynum's better this year? two words- conditioning and dedication. before this summer, he had neither. he was infamous in la for slacking off and being unmotivated (jackson always criticized him for that). but surprise! surprise! after kobe's rants this summer, in bynum's own words, they motivated him to work out harder and condition his body, and lo and behold, he's bulked up for this year to better handle his position. i don't agree with what kobe did this summer, but you can't deny the effects of it. sometimes good things happen from apparently bad things, and life's full of those examples.

"After the season started — this season, mind you, the one for which he was seriously being considered for MOST VALUABLE PLAYER — he continued his tantrum. He nearly coerced a blockbuster trade with Chicago that would have drastically altered the rosters — and futures — of both clubs. While Bryant was whining his way through the first two months of the season"
-Does the summer even matter to the MVP criteria, which is a regular season judgment? And why are you making up lies? Once the season started (actually even before the season started during the FIBA tournaments) he ALWAYS kept his mouth shut about the front office problems and rumors and deflected questions EVEN WHEN reporters kept badgering him about it 24/7 for months (it was the media who kept stirring the trade rumors, not kobe). People were even betting that when the season started that Kobe would sit out games to make a point, but they were surprised to see him completely focused and not distracted when the season began. Coincidence that the Lakers played so well the first couple of months until Bynum went down? Kobe was praised by the media for making the off season a non-issue. Again, quit making up facts to fit your opinion.

"Bryant finally had the one-man show he’d always wanted — and the team was floundering."
-the one man show he wanted? do you even realize why he wanted out of la? because he wanted HELP. congratulations for missing the point of the entire summer. and once again, why are you making up facts? the lakers were one of top teams even after bynum went down and even before pau arrived. if you call being the top 4 teams in the west as "floundering", be my guest.

"But Bryant pouted and sulked and demanded that O’Neal be traded, because Bryant wanted the spotlight all to himself. "
you do realize that kobe had no say in shaq being traded? and that everyone in retrospect understands that that was the better move than trading away kobe? and that shaq was also one of the biggest whiner and selfish, egotistical hypocrite who complained about having to share the spotlight with kobe? please investigate all the facts of a scenario before lambasting kobe.

"Bryant wouldn’t be in the MVP running if he traded places with James, Paul or Garnett. The things he would say to the Cleveland media about Zydrunas Ilgauskas’ clumsy feet and Anderson Varejao’s goofy hair would make Hitler cry."
hmm, i wonder what kobe was doing the last 2 seasons when he was leading smush, kwame, cook, and and undeveloped bynum, farmar, and vujacic to the playoffs in the infinitely more difficult western conference?

"Bryant isn’t even the most valuable player on his own team. Anyone can come on strong when things are going well, as Bryant has post-Pau. Bynum was the one who held it down early in the season, when Bryant was griping and the outlook seemed bleak at best.
When he’s happy, Bryant allows everyone else to have fun. But when he’s down — like he was at the beginning of the year or with O’Neal earlier in his career — he makes things miserable for all around him."
-wow, i really don't even know what to say to this because it speaks for itself on how uneducated you are. do you know how ineffective bynum and pau would be without kobe?

and you go to georgetown? didn't they teach you anything there? you truly are an embarrassment to your school

Any moral person would hate the author's idea and perception of Kobe.

Unfortunately, Kobe is not an idea, he is a real person, and the author's idea of Kobe does not mesh with reality.

so here's the lesson for you to learn if you haven't been able to absorb it:

to write a credible, cogent article, you need to base it on real facts, not made up "facts". you also need to analyze the facts and interpret them before making up your opinions, not conversely. otherwise, like you did here, you just established yourself as an uneducated fool completely lacking in intelligence. there's really no avoiding that for you, because all people have to do is compare your statements to the facts and easily find that yours are false.

I am neither a Laker fan nor a Kobe apologist. I do, however, enjoy a well written article. This wasn't one and I am considering suing you to get back the time I wasted reading this piece. One word for you: research.

There's no point rehashing some of the very valid points my fellow readers have touched upon, but I have to wonder how this piece passed through the editorial staff and received a thumbs up. I hope this is just a hobby for you, because if writing is what you hope to hang your hat on, the Weekly World News might be a good goal. I'm sure their "Bush Meets With Alien" articles have the same level of credible content.

Wow - not only did you not do research for this article, you totally manipulated Kobe's quote from the Washington Post to make him look bad. The actual quote was:

"This is a special crew. I have more bullets in the chamber now," Bryant said. "We had Smush Parker, who is not really playing now. We had Kwame Brown, who's in Memphis and not really playing much now. That was my point guard and my center, and in a pretty tough Western Conference, we still managed to win 45 games [in 2005-06] and get in contention. Now I'm fortunate to have weapons that my peers have had the last several years, with [Amare] Stoudemire and [Shawn] Marion, [Tony] Parker and [Manu] Ginóbili. Now I have weapons."

It is shocking that you are even allowed to write. This article is totally unprofessional. I'm ashamed of Georgetown University.

(As hard as it is for me, I have restrained myself from inserting an off-color remark about Bryant’s past marital infidelity here.)

Really? You're pointing out that you're refraining from making an "off-color remark"? You might want to ask an Engineering Department student to make you a back-patting machine as one of their projects.

I just read another one of your stories (Greedy Sports Monopolists Prove Easy to Root Against), hoping this was just a bad day for you. If your parents are paying for your education, I feel very sad for them.

Wow... What is your major at Georgetown? I REALLY hope it's not journalism.

He runs down a court and throws a ball through a metal hoop. Additionally, he can barely read. Who cares?

YOU ARE A MORON!! Have you watched a single Laker game this season? Kobe focuses the first half of each game purely on getting his teamates involved rather than scoring points (even though it is ten times easier for him to make a circus shot than it is for most of his teamates to make an open fifteen footer). If he doesn't win the MVP, it will be because of retarded sportswriters like you.

i am glad everybody has really slammed ur column. i was going to do the same thing. now i am spared the time

this dude needs to get BANGED by people at his school.."Bryant isn’t even the most valuable player on his own team" that has to be the most retarded comment made in the history of sports... are u saying a 7 time all defensive player, a 10 time all star performer, a 3 time scoring champion and one of the greatest players and clutch performers isnt the most valuable person on his team? are u saying that paul gasol, a player who has never won a playoff game is? Or andrew bynum, the 2nd year player? WIth your statement i guess the lakers should've traded kobe and HOPED bynum became the next shaq rite? dumb F*cking idiot..ur a disgrace to your school. When kobes raising his MVP, the nba title and mvp finals, your school should fail your Ass for this piece of crap that you call "writing"

your writing is pure speculation..you clearly havent followed a laker game this year and kobe has clearly transformed himself into a better team player.

It amazes me how you think that kobe is not the most valuable player on his team. Were talkign about kobe bryant.. one that is constantly compared to michael jordan (no matter how far fetched it is) by many anaylists and people.

Although the article was biased, i too dont feel Kobe deserved to win the mvp award... Not because of his selfishness, not because of his lowered stats this year as opposed to previous, and not because he raped a girl. He shouldnt have won the award simply because there is a CLEAR better choice. Chris Paul. Im not a fan of the hornets, so this is not a biased comment. That kid led a squad of once-upon-a-times (Like peja) and no bodies (everyone else) to the playoffs and is tearing shit up! 6-1 in the post season and are most likely going to sweep the Spurs? Are you kidding me? But, naturally, i knew he wouldnt win it, the NBA is no longer just a sport, its a business... hence the reason we get poor and noticeably bad ref calls in the playoffs... cough suns and spurs last year cough. We all know theres teams that if they play in the finals, ratings will go up which is money to the league. Which is why im projecting that when the Lakers and Hornets play, we will see some shitty ass calls because of the whole "Lakers vs. celtics" bullshit hype. But, no worries, after that series, after Chris paul has finished dismantling the lakers entirely, everyone will sit back and think, "Oh shit, theres the real Mvp."

Im out, Pz

Oh boo hoo stop your crying what did you think this article was about its too bad we have nasty players like kobe and not good ol basketball players like Micheal Jordan, those were the days