And then there was Kobe Bryant.

And as you know, when you played against these guys and rich, you know this you could deal with the ridiculous athlete.

But you could find a way to bait that person into maybe doing something they weren't comfortable doing right.

And there were There were shortcuts you could take to deal with that.

It'll get me wrong.

That was a challenging enough itself.

And then you had the super fundamentally sound guy.

But he wasn't gonna blow by.

You were jump over you.

Those guys represented a different kind of challenge to, But again wasn't a type of thing where you like your heart rate was going up because of that.

Then you have a guy like Kobe Bryant who had the ridiculous athleticism, freak athleticism combined with what I think might be the greatest footwork in the history of the game.

When you look at his ability to turn either shoulder to pivot off either foot to go either direction, he had no weakness whatsoever as a player.

So when you combine the two things that one now what you have is a nightmare on your hands, and that's what Kobe was to defend.

And the other thing Richard was and I, you know, played 10 years in the league, and Michael Jordan won six titles during that time.

So I got to play against him a lot to barely got Kobe at the very beginning of his career.

The one thing they did have in common.

They were the only two guys I ever played against that never took a second off where they weren't thinking about going when they got it, so you could never relax.

You couldn't turn your head for a split second, make the slightest mistake.

They were back cutting you every time they caught it.

Their initial reaction was to turn square up and try to go on you.

I played against a lot of Hall of Famers, and some of those guys would take place, offer they spotted up and watch somebody else play.

You could take a breath, not the case with Look, I prayed against Prime Kobe and MJ on his comeback, and when I tell you he was the first person, Kobe Bryant was the first person that wouldn't play with colleges like they're running fist up, five down.

Watch the back cut like he was like a free safety in their defense.

So, to your point, when you combine the physical ability where okay, he's one of top three athletes when you combine the footwork and the technique and how hard he worked there, and then you combine the mental, the ability to focus in and help his team mates.

It was like you were sitting out there and you were going against a one man machine and everything was built around him.

What were your conversations like with your teammates before you had to face coach like, How are you going to stop him?

Well, it was Did you get some rest?

Because you knew that it was going to be on both sides.

And I was hope fortunate to play with Vince Carter for multiple years.

And, you know, he always wanted that challenge like Kobe Always.

It didn't matter if it was T Mac, it didn't matter who it was.

He took that challenge, and so against Vince Carter he would go and just trying.

And so I would had the fortune of having maybe the third best offender on me.

And if I ever got going, all of a sudden it was a switch, and then Kobe was going to be guarding me, and you looked at it like, Okay, this is a sign of respect.

This is a sign of respect.

He was like this moment with Vince.

I started on him.

You're playing well, so he was just constantly moving back and forth to whoever it was.

He felt it was time to slow down or stop more than even rejoicing in the success and the winning and everything else.

You're it's you're driven by a fear of failing, and I think that's Kobe experienced.

And so, as a result, when you can finally relax, take a breath from all that.

Now, when you give everything to the game, your your focus turns to this right here.

You know, I think about that.

You know, the moments that I was able to be fortunate to coach my kids and man the countless tournaments and eight games I coached both my Children and the moments like this just being in the gym with them, rebounding for them, having fun with them, driving the tournament's talking in the car, getting ready for the games like all of those things, like that's what I look so forward to as a dad.

Kobe obviously was getting into that phase, and he's right about sure.

He probably had no intention, maybe of going down that road with John You have to wait to see is Are my Children gonna take a loving of this game the way that I did?

And once she did, the body obviously was clearly there, and it was starting to get his juices flowing again for that.

And what could she becomes?

So I'm just I feel so, so, so sad that he won't get to experience that, and to your point, you look at you know how she started evolve as a player and then how he started to support her heroes.

Now he might have supported women's basketball long before you know his daughter was.

It was a focal point for him in that space, but she was a fan of so many people, so all of a sudden you would see him at UConn basketball games.

You would see him going and watching Oregon play, and he was constantly talking about women's basketball, constantly talking about the U.

S women's national soccer team.

He just started to support even Mawr, who his daughter's heroes were.

And that's what made her and am so bonded.

And that's why the entire world got tow.

Watch him be a father to another future sport to another athlete and which is the entire basketball community tire, female and male sports world.

We're all watching him grow up like we talked about was a reality show.

He started it 17 and we watched him do every aspect of his career, including being a father.

Her favorite, eh?

NBA player was Trey Young and just even seeing the impact that her loving Trey has had on him.

And even before all of this tragedy happened, I think it's incredible legs to just look at how that has become a part of this to all the people that not only her father affected, but that G has affected in her legacy.

Yeah, it's amazing to think about first of all, how special you have to be as a young person to even embrace the sport when your parent is on that level, think about the pressure that comes with that and some of the things that you could run from and be afraid off because you're afraid of not living up to certain things.

So to think that she had that quality at such a young age, she wasn't going to run from it.

She was going to embrace it and she wanted to chase that and see how far I could go with this.

I think that's something that athletes connect to when you see something special in a young person that has not only the talent, but they've got that it quality, that they're not going to run from the light, they're going to run to it.

And that is, I think, why garlic, Trey Young and other athletes can really identify with her.

And you see the reaction of Tracy McGrady.

A lot of it is that Yeah, and look at how he passed.

It was going to her basketball game with a bunch of her teammates and friends, and it was It's something that when you get toe watch all of this, go on and then you see how he passed.

It is it's been something that touched everyone and me personally, he has shown how to evolve even at in that transition in basketball, right?

So after you're done retiring and you see him spending more time with his family, you see him coaching all of a sudden to every guy that's about to retire or hey, you, you've mirrored Kobe your whole life and you see what he's doing now.

He has set an example for fathers everywhere, and that's something that I commend him, and you know it is going to be dearly missed.