Kobe Bryant Quotes

“The most important thing is to try and inspire people so that they can be great in whatever they want to do.”

— Kobe Bryant

“If you're afraid to fail, then you're probably going to fail.”

— Kobe Bryant

“Everything negative - pressure, challenges - is all an opportunity for me to rise.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. No matter what the injury - unless it's completely debilitating - I'm going to be the same player I've always been. I'll figure it out. I'll make some tweaks, some changes, but I'm still coming.”

— Kobe Bryant

These young guys are playing checkers. I'm out there playing chess.

— Kobe Bryant

The people who truly know me know what I'm like. There have been people who try to say things that aren't fair, and I check them. And then they don't like me because I checked them.

— Kobe Bryant

“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.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I'll do whatever it takes to win games, whether it's sitting on a bench waving a towel, handing a cup of water to a teammate, or hitting the game-winning shot.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I'm more than comfortable just sitting back and scoring 21, 22 points or whatever and getting 10, 11 assists whatever the case might be. More than comfortable with that. It's just a matter of the pieces that you have around you and what you can do to elevate everybody else.”

— Kobe Bryant

I'm chasing perfection.

— Kobe Bryant

“I've played with IVs before, during and after games. I've played with a broken hand, a sprained ankle, a torn shoulder, a fractured tooth, a severed lip, and a knee the size of a softball. I don't miss 15 games because of a toe injury that everybody knows wasn't that serious in the first place.”

— Kobe Bryant

“Christmas morning, I'm going to open presents with my kids. I'm going to take pictures of them opening the presents. Then I'm going to come to the Staples Center and get ready to work.”

— Kobe Bryant

It never bothered me when people would say, 'You only win championships because you're playing with Shaq.' It bothered me when he said it.

— Kobe Bryant

“I'm not the most patient of people.”

— Kobe Bryant

“Sports are such a great teacher. I think of everything they've taught me: camaraderie, humility, how to resolve differences.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I don't talk trash often, but when I do, I go for the jugular.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I don't want to be the next Michael Jordan, I only want to be Kobe Bryant.”

— Kobe Bryant

I don't think a coach becomes the right coach until he wins a championship.

— Kobe Bryant

“I draw from the crowd a lot.”

— Kobe Bryant

“Pooper scooper? Yeah, I've done it a few times. Every once in a while, you have to.”

— Kobe Bryant

“At the end of 2003, my game was complete. Shooting, defense, using the dribble, transition, midrange stuff was all there. Then it was about fine-tuning and trying to improve in each area.”

— Kobe Bryant

“We all know what flopping is when we see it. The stuff that you see is where guys aren't really getting hit at all and are just flailing around like a fish out of water.”

— Kobe Bryant

“Heroes come and go, but legends are forever.”

— Kobe Bryant

“If you want to make history, you have to do historic things”

— Kobe Bryant

“I don't set out to make a really hot shoe, I set out to make a product that is true to where I am.”

— Kobe Bryant

“It's not about the number of hours you practice, it's about the number of hours your mind is present during the practice”

— Kobe Bryant

“If you see me in a fight with a bear, pray for the bear”

— Kobe Bryant

“I was probably born a scorer, but I was made a winner. Whatever works, whatever wins championships, wins games, that's what I do.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I don't have to hear that criticism, that idotic criticism anymore.”

— Kobe Bryant

I was just letting the shots fly. You know, I don't leave any bullets in the chamber.

— Kobe Bryant

“There's a reason why players that have multiple championships have multiple championships. There's a certain characteristic and an understanding and knowledge and that's not something that's easily taught. You kind of have to go through it and it kind of has to be part of your DNA from the beginning.”

— Kobe Bryant

The party's just getting started. This is where the fun starts.

— Kobe Bryant

“The guy said NBA players are one in a million, ... I said, 'Man, look, I'm going to be that one in a million.”

— Kobe Bryant

“Where are your balls at?”

— Kobe Bryant

“The Kobe 8 is about enhanced performance. It's the most comfortable shoe I have worn. It's simplistic but has an edge to it.”

— Kobe Bryant

“It doesn't matter to me what place I get traded to. If I was traded someplace - I'd play anywhere.”

— Kobe Bryant

“Are you willing to push the right buttons even if it means being perceived as the villain? ... I'd rather be perceived as a winner than a good teammate. I wish they both went hand in hand all the time but that's just not reality. ... I have nothing in common with lazy people who blame others for their lack of success.”

— Kobe Bryant

“You have to be able to separate business from the love of the game. There were a lot of decisions made business-wise that I wasn't happy with, and I took a lot of blame over the years. But you have to be able to separate that from the love you have for the game.”

— Kobe Bryant

Because we're old as sh*t. What do you want?

— Kobe Bryant

I enjoy playing at the heart of it is just a kid who really loves playing the game of basketball.

— Kobe Bryant

“I'm just so excited. We all are. We've been waiting for this [the gold medal] for years now and it's finally here. This meant so much. It just felt so good.”

— Kobe Bryant

“To be honest with you, I (would) much rather play basketball and not be famous.”

— Kobe Bryant

“He is a fool who only sees the mischiefs that are past.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I was an idiot when I was a kid.”

— Kobe Bryant

I won't react to something just because I'm supposed to, because I'm an African-American

— Kobe Bryant

“Just got one more than Shaq. You can take that to the bank.”

— Kobe Bryant

“I'm just right down the middle, man, ... It doesn't matter to me. I'd love him (Phil Jackson) as a coach. It doesn't matter to me. If they want him here, he'll be here. If he wants to come, he'll come, he'll coach and we'll go from there.”

— Kobe Bryant

What does perfection look like to me? Championship rings

— Kobe Bryant

“He [Phil Jackson] is such a basketball genius in terms of the details of the game, the little nuances of the game and the rhythm of the game.”

— Kobe Bryant

“The hunger [to success] is the same, no matter what it is that you're doing. It's like an unquenchable thirst to learn more, or to feel like you could have done more, and to be brutally honest and self critical, which is very hard to do. It's easy, and human nature is to just blame somebody else. It's very, very hard to self assess.”

— Kobe Bryant