Kobe Bryant Heaped Praise On Shaq For Making Him A Better Leader

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Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal‘s relationship deteriorated over the course of their eight years together with the Lakers, but time has apparently healed any old wounds that existed between the two former teammates.

Shaq is set to be honored by the Lakers with a statue out front of Staples Center, and Bryant couldn’t be more excited that his old cohort for three NBA championships would be immortalized in Los Angeles. Bryant spoke with the Los Angeles Times about his time with Shaq and wasn’t just appreciative of their time together, but was downright glowing in his praise of the big man.

“When you win three titles together and you’ve had so much impact on one another’s legacy as a player and as a champion,” Bryant said. “There is absolutely no way in the world I would miss an opportunity to talk about him and thank him and to acknowledge everything that he’s done for not only this organization and the city, but for me personally.”

This may come as a surprise to some, considering how contentious their relationship was in the mid-to-late 2000s, but it appears that as both have gotten older and retired from the NBA, they’ve grown to appreciate the other. Bryant even went so far as to explain how he learned how to be a leader from O’Neal.

“I’ve learned so much from him,” Bryant said. “He’s extremely, extremely good at bringing others on the team and pushing them. Striking the balance between hard leadership and a pat on the back. Those are things I learned from him. … That was a big, big shift for me.”

Bryant also explained that he never saw it as a power struggle between he and O’Neal going into the 2004 offseason that saw Shaq leave Los Angeles. Instead, when O’Neal requested to be traded, Bryant says any plans he had of leaving as a free agent went away because the Lakers “the Lakers were not going to lose Shaq and me in the same year.”

Shaq and Kobe will be reunited in Staples Center again on Friday night for the unveiling of O’Neal’s statue, and it’s only a matter of time before the roles are reversed and it’s Bryant being immortalized in bronze.

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