The Los Angeles Lakers are in the midst of one of their worst seasons in franchise history. They currently hold a 16-61 record which ties their most losses in a season, the other one being last season. Kobe Bryant’s farewell tour is coming to an end, and apparently Byron Scott is frustrated because they aren’t sending Bryant off properly.
Lakers coach Byron Scott expressed frustration with the way his team is playing considering these are the final games for Kobe Bryant, who has five games left and is retiring this summer after a 20-season NBA career.
“It bothers me that his last five, six, seven, eight games are going to be with the way we’re playing as a team,” Scott said. “That bothers me, because you’re talking about a champion. That bothers me, because he is a champion. And I hate to see him go out this way. Unfortunately this is the way it’s going to be.
“It bothers the hell out of me that somebody who’s given 20 years to this league and has played through broken fingers, come back from the Achilles, come back from the shoulder surgery, and he still goes out there and gives it everything he has, that bothers me.”
Understandably, losing bothers a lot of people, and it’s obviously bothering Byron Scott right now. It’s been a very long season for Lakers fans, so they’ll probably agree that this isn’t the way Kobe should go out. However, the current state of the team was a giveaway that this was going to happen. Everyone knew that they will be rebuilding through the draft until Kobe retired so that they could then sign more free agents with the added cap space.
Kobe definitely deserves to go out with a ring, riding into the sunset, but if everyone retired that way, then that kind of moment wouldn’t be special.
