Jalen Rose has heard plenty about Kobe Bryant’s 81-point game in the dozen years since the Lakers legend’s epic performance against Rose’s Toronto Raptors.
Bryant spoke with Rose at a Nike event in Los Angeles on Thursday night and, unlike Joel Embiid, Paul Pierce, the entire ESPN network and countless others in the NBA community, Bryant is not here to drag Rose for not guarding him well enough on January 22, 2006.
In fact, Bryant essentially let Rose off the hook for his defensive end of the game, saying he didn’t actually guard Bryant that much on that night.
https://twitter.com/CountOnVic/status/964303470453915648
“I’ve been on the wrong side of your all-time great history,” Rose said during the conversation. “Your historic 81-point game.” What followed was a question about how he focused during that game, but before Bryant answered he wanted to make clear to those in attendance that the ribbing Rose has taken in the years that followed isn’t necessarily fair.
“In all fairness, though, you really did not guard me in that game, dude,” Bryant said. “You get a bad rap for that but you might have defended me, like twice.”
Rose was gracious in the face of Bryant’s kindness, but he did
“I actually had to go back and count it,” Rose said. “I got a healthy 19.”
The exchange drew laughs from the crowd, as well as a joke from Bryant where he implied Rose really was to blame for it.
“OK then,” Bryant said. “Well maybe you did.”
His answer to the question is below, and it’s actually pretty interesting.
https://twitter.com/CountOnVic/status/964303470453915648
It probably won’t stop Rose from getting dragged about one of the greatest individual performances in NBA history, but both of them seem to know the score. Rose knows exactly how responsible he is for Kobe’s performance. And now Bryant knows, too.
