Kobe Bryant has gone down as one of the greatest Lakers of all time and one can make the case he sits at the very top. Bryant won five championships with the Lakers and finished as their all-time leading scorer with 33,643 points over 20 seasons.
It all could have turned out quite differently, however, as Bryant had a very impressive pre-draft workout with their rivals, the Los Angeles Clippers, back in 1996. Footage from that workout went viral again and it shows just how great Kobe was at that young age.
As for Jordan Schultz’s question on why the Clippers didn’t draft Kobe, the man himself revealed the reason once. Bryant said the team told him it was the best workout they had ever seen, but they still wouldn’t draft him. The Clippers felt they wouldn’t be taken seriously in Los Angeles if they drafted a 17-year-old.
With the seventh pick in the 1996 draft, they picked Lorenzen Wright while Bryant would be selected with the 13th pick by the Charlotte Hornets, who traded him to the Lakers. NBA history would have turned out quite differently had the Clippers decided to take that risk and who knows, they might have even won a title or two by now.
Jerry West Knew Kobe Bryant Was The One For Them After His Workout With The Lakers
The Clippers weren’t the only ones left in awe of Bryant after a workout, as the great Jerry West was highly impressed as well. West was the GM of the Lakers at the time and when he saw Kobe give Michael Cooper trouble during his workout, he knew Bryant was the one for them.
West made the bold decision to trade away their starting center Vlade Divac for Kobe and that gamble could have backfired, but he landed Shaquille O’Neal in free agency that year to cap off one of the greatest offseasons in NBA history. West then signed Phil Jackson to be the head coach in 1999 as he laid the foundations for their historic three-peat from 2000 to 2002.
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