Jerry West Remembers Talking Kobe Bryant Out Of Trying To Join His Grizzlies In Free Agency

Jerry West had a special relationship with Kobe Bryant, as he was the general manager of the Lakers when they traded for Kobe Bryant in the 1996 NBA Draft.

That relationship was apparently strong enough that Bryant once looked into following West to the Memphis Grizzlies in 2004, but the Hall of Famer talked Bryant out of considering the move despite being Memphis’ GM. West told that story on this week’s episode of Podcast P with Paul George, explaining that he told Kobe “No, you belong somewhere out here.”

“He became a free agent. Ok? And he called me and his agent then was Rob Pelinka. And so I met them in Orange County in a hotel room and he said he wanted to come to Memphis and play basketball. And I looked at him, I said, are you kidding me? And he said no, and I said, ‘Kobe, no, no. You know, it’s just you belong somewhere out here.’ And even though he would have never played there, I just want to reassure him that don’t feel like you have any obligation with me or the Grizzlies to play here and because he would have never played there, it wasn’t gonna happen.”

The stories of Bryant nearly joining the Chicago Bulls are well known, but apparently they weren’t the only destination he was considering leaving L.A. for.

It’s very funny when West goes “I guess that might’ve been tampering,” but instead of tampering to help his team at the time he was helping Bryant and the Lakers. Memphis was coming off of a 50-win season in 2003-04, before getting swept by the Spurs in the first round of the playoffs, and it would’ve paired Bryant with Pau Gasol four years before the Spanish star was traded to the Lakers and helped Bryant win two more championships in L.A.