More than likely Kobe Bryant is your favorite player’s favorite player, that is unless you are reality tv star Hoopz or a fan of Kobe’s favorite whipping boy Pau Gasol. Either way, Kobe has garnered the respect of his peers with the game on the line.
In a poll of his peers conducted by Sports Illustrated, Kobe received 74 percent of 166 votes as the preferred shot taker in the closing seconds of a game.
Carmelo Anthony, arguably the best scorer in the league shockingly didn’t receive one vote. Also shut out in the voting was Lebron James, but we are all aware of his shortcomings at the end of games.
Rounding out the vote is back to back scoring champion Kevin Durant with 8 percent, Dwyane Wade at 3 percent, Boston Celtic Ray Allen and Dallas Maverick Dirk Nowitzki each at 2 percent.
It doesn’t surprise me the least bit that Kobe received a large percentage of the vote. I once had a conversation with two of the younger players in the league who were seriously willing to argue that Kobe was better than Michael Jordan. Obviously they never got a chance to play against Jordan as they had with Kobe.
In assessing the vote I’ve come to the conclusion that many of the league’s players may echo those very same sentiments or Ron Artest voted a lot more than he was supposed to.
