NBA Coaches Called Lakers Icon Kobe Bryant For Advice Says Scout

Kobe Bryant was respected for his accolades on the basketball court. The Black Mamba won five NBA Championships as a member of the Los Angeles Lakers playing alongside the likes of Naismith Hall of Famer, Shaquille O’Neal and Pau Gasol.

A 15-time All-NBA Teamer, Bryant is also a 12-time member of the NBA’s All-Defensive Team and the NBA’s Most Valuable Player in 2008.

Bryant died in a helicopter crash that took the lives of nine people, including Bryant’s daughter, Gigi on Sunday, January 26.

Stories have poured in about Bryant’s impact to the game of basketball and how he was impactful to his contituents within the NBA.

During a recent conversation with the Scoop B Radio Podcast, Sacramento Kings scout, Adam Filippi shared that Bryant wasn’t just a resource to NBA players, but he also was a wealth of knowledge to NBA coaches.

Check out a snippet from our Q&A conversation below:

Brandon ‘Scoop B’ Robinson: Adam, help me understand something, I don’t know if it’s confidential. If it is, tell me. But when you look at – when you mentioned Kobe or players and coaches reached out to Kobe and asked for advice. What kind of things were coaches asking him?

Adam Filippi: Well, I can give you an example and I don’t want to speak for Coach [Steve] Clifford but, a few years ago when I was in Charlotte with Coach Cliff he brought up – he was always looking to better himself that’s one thing I liked about him. Like he would go talk to you know, football coaches, college coaches that were successful and kind of pick their minds and he told me he would reach out to Kobe. He would reach out to Kobe and ask him like kind of what’s the mindset of a star player, and what is the approach and what do they expect from us coaches, and how do we win them over, and how do we gain credibility…now a lot of these coaches today are not former players they need to work extra hard to prove themselves. So I think that was Coach Clifford’s point and I’m sure there have been other guys over the years, I know that he had a very strong relationship with Ettore Messina who was an assistant there one year with the Lakers, you know he was a European coaching legend and I know they stayed in touch and he could pick his brain. So again, I’m sure there have been more players looking for his advice and mentorship but people that are older than you are asking for some kind of information, I think it’s even more extraordinary that this guy had SOMETHING. He just saw the game in a way very few players ever have and again, the fact that he was willing to share his knowledge with the younger people or with people looking for advice in the coaching ranks, I think that says so much about him as a giver and that was a side that not everyone saw when he was a player.

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