Chapter 501 - The NBA Season Continues 9 (1/2)
Kobe Bryant was not happy to hear that, but he had to admit that Jake was right in what he was saying, the best teams in recent years had a very good Center or PF to make them a good team.
Even Michael Jordan's team that was different from all the teams because they had Michael Jordan and coach Phil Jackson knew how to make a team that worked very well with Scottie Pippen, but even that team had Dennis Rodman to catch the rebounds that were a PF and before there was Horace Grant who was a great player.
The Boston Celtics team in the past had Larry Bird, but it also had Robert Parish and Kevin McHale, the Los Angeles Lakers team in the past had Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the Detroit Pistons team had Dennis Rodman and Bill Laimbeer.
The Houston Rockets team that won recently also had Hakeem Olajuwon to help the team win, thinking about it Kobe Bryant had to admit that for the past 20 years Centers and PF have been instrumental in all the teams that have won major titles.
So it wasn't strange that Jake just thought the Los Angeles Lakers team had a chance to win this season because of Shaquille O'Neal, Kobe accepted that, but he still had some more difficult questions to ask Jake.
”And who do you think is currently the second most important player on our team?”
Hearing this, Jake understood that this was the question that Kobe Bryant wanted to ask from the beginning, once again he knew that being honest would not be the best for him, but Jake didn't want to lie just to remain Kobe's friend.
”I think that I am currently the second most important player on our team, because I can play 48 minutes in every game, because of the steals I make, because of assists too, points and rebounds are the least important.”
”But to be quite honest, I think our team doesn't need me, if I didn't have it on the team we would still win most games this season and lose just 2 more games, our team just needs Shaquille O'Neal and more a skilled player to be a strong team.”
”But our team needs three skilled players to have a chance to win the NBA title this season without having to sign any players.”
Kobe Bryant was not surprised by this because he realized that even though Jake was modest and humble, Jake was very self-confident and knew his skills and the importance he had for the team.
”I already expected you to think you were better than me, so I'm not surprised by that, so if you think that, what do you think I can improve to be an even better player?”
Jake didn't expect Kobe Bryant to accept it so well that and Jake was better than him, but it seemed like he was more interested in how he could improve than to care what Jake really thought.
”I'll be honest again then, I think what you need to improve the most on is your defense, you need in the future to become the best defensive player on your team if you want to be the most important player.”
”I don't know if you noticed, but Shaquille O'Neal is improving a lot in his defense, I think next season if he works hard he could be one of the best defensive players in the NBA.”
”You are younger and you can certainly improve a lot more in this area, moreover, I think you need to learn to play more thinking about the team than about individual plays, I understood this as soon as I joined this team and that's why I have more than 10 assists in most games.”
”Our team has good players, especially you, Shaquille O'Neal and me, so you don't have to force individual moves when you can pass the ball, of course when you have confidence you can make the individual move because I know you have the quality to do that.”
”Another thing that you could improve on was to start trying more three-point shots and also improve your mid-range shot, you can't miss many attacks for our team to win.”
”So above all, you have to understand that you need a team with good players to win, you alone can't even score more than 50 points in all games, so you have to be more friendly with your teammates and also know to play better as a team.”
Kobe Bryant was really shocked to hear everything Jake said, he had already realized that Jake was sincere, but he didn't expect Jake to think he had so many flaws even when he was one of the most praised young players.
The problem was that all the criticisms that Jake had spoken were things that Jake was very skillful, Jake made few attacks in the game and knew very well how to play as a team, besides, Jake was currently the best defensive players of the Los Angeles Lakers team.