Kobe Bryant Team Quotations

You want me to own a team and deal with these rich, spoiled stubborn athletes, and try to get them to perform? No thank you.

My hand was bothering me. It was tough for me to shoot the ball. I asked the team to put up the steam a little bit.

I absolutely hate it. I just hate it. I don't want to hear any comparisons between me and him. Enough is enough. He had a brilliant career, obviously, one of the greatest careers ever, if not the greatest, and I'm here playing with my team and we're trying to do great things. Just let the past be the past. Just embrace what I'm doing. Stop trying to compare it to what he did. Just enjoy what's going on now.

I went after it a little bit more aggressively and the team did a good job looking for me. I felt we had to get something going in the third quarter.

It is fun for us as a team to get a win like this. It builds camaraderie and togetherness.

It doesn't matter whose team it is. But this is his team, so it's time for him to act like it,

I wasn't even thinking about it. It is what it is. I just move on. I have my team to worry about and getting my guys ready for the game. I just go out there and do what I do.

We are a young team and we played extremely well tonight. We just take it game by game and we are starting to see more success.

We played hard tonight. Even the last two games that we lost on the road, we played hard. We just did not come through down the stretch of the game. Tonight was no different. We are a physical team and we got after them a little bit. All around, it was a good victory.

We're a really young team that comes into this hostile environment playing against a championship contender. And we didn't play well. I mean, at all. And we found ourselves in a position where we should've won this ballgame.

We are a much better team right now. We are playing really well and executing very well. We are moving the ball and defensively we are working hard, hustling and closing out the shots.

You got to talk to the team when plays break down, but nothing close to what (reporter Peter) Vecsey or (TV analyst David) Aldridge said.

It was a big game for us, ... We are a young team and we had to battle back to get the win.

Any player that was going to come down the lane at that point in time, I was going to let him know that he just can't walk through there. I think we as a team have to do a better job of establishing that.

It's a huge honor. I'm very proud to be a part of the team and us trying to gain back what we feel is ours -- and that's the gold medal.

It's not important to me at all. I really could care less. It's just out of necessity. The team needs me to do it to get through a tough point in the season. It's all that is, no more, no less.

They are the best team in the league right now. There's not much more to say about what makes them tough --versatility, execution and understanding of concepts.

It made me feel good, yeah, because we've been through so many wars together. And it feels good to kind of be able to enjoy ... the sweetness of it. And now to be able to move on, for the organization to move on, the city to move on and to focus on building this team, (I) wish him all the best with his team down on South Beach.

I wear the number 10 Jersey for the US National Team in honour of the Greatest athlete I have ever seen: Messi.

I didn't expect this award [the 2008 MVP] would come to me. I'm surprised. I've played pretty well in other seasons. Our team hasn't been as good. Things just fell into place.

For us to be the team that got him that historic 10th championship is special for us.

Everybody wants to talk about NBA players being selfish and arrogant and individuals. But what you saw today was a team bonding and facing adversity and coming out with a big win.

I felt like when we came back from the All-Star break we needed everybody to feel like they were part of the team, ... I'm just trying to do whatever the team needs at any given time.