The practice gym was nearly empty, echoing with the sound of sneakers squeaking and balls thumping against hardwood. It was just after noon in Chicago, and the Bulls were supposed to be winding down. But Michael Jordan never wound down. Not really.
Dennis, James, and Ron Harper stood clustered by the sideline, catching their breath. Phil Jackson, arms folded, watched as Michael laced up what looked like battered tennis shoes—Nikes, but not the flashy ones. His sweatpants were rolled at the ankles, and he wore a practice jersey that looked as if it had seen a hundred wars.
“MJ, you’re done for today,” Phil called out, but Michael just shook his head, a sly grin on his face.
“Nah, put me in. Scrimmage for minutes, right? I’m not sitting out.”
The team exchanged glances. When Michael wanted to play, you didn’t argue. He stalked onto the court, picking his team, eyeing Ron Harper and Randy Brown. The air changed; it always did when Michael was on the floor. He didn’t just want to win—he wanted to dominate, to embarrass, to make you question why you ever picked up a basketball.
The scrimmage was fierce. Michael dove for loose balls, barked orders, and when he got a steal, he broke away with a speed and grace that defied the casual look of his gear. One of the younger players, eager to prove himself, saw his chance. He cut Michael off at the rim, ready to block the dunk he knew was coming.
But Michael soared, his midsection level with the kid’s face, and threw down a dunk so violent it rattled the backboard. “Block this!” he yelled, and the gym erupted in laughter and awe.
Later that night, the young player called his mother from the hotel. “Ma, I just saw the greatest ever. He did it in tennis shoes, no tape, no brace. Like it was Game 7.” His mother just laughed. “Took you long enough to admit it.”
Michael’s intensity wasn’t reserved for games. In the locker room, he was methodical, almost obsessive. He’d adjust his socks until they were exactly the same height, tuck his jersey with surgical precision. A wrinkle in his shirt could set him off. He was a gladiator, and his armor had to be perfect.
“He wanted to destroy you,” Ron Harper would later say. “Not just beat you—make you quit, make you hope you never had to face him again. Some nights, guys would foul out just to get off the court. I’d guard him and just compliment every shot. ‘Good one, MJ.’ That’s the only way to survive.”
Years later, in Los Angeles, a new legend was forming. Kobe Bryant was still a teenager, but already his reputation echoed through the league. He was relentless, curious, and more than a little obsessed.
One day, a former Bull pulled Kobe aside. “Why’d you skip college, kid?”
Kobe’s answer was simple and direct: “I heard MJ was going to retire. I wanted to play against him. I didn’t want to miss my shot.”
It was the kind of answer that made you smile and shake your head. Kobe already had the mindset—he wanted to measure himself against the very best, and he knew the window was closing.
On the road, Kobe was different from most rookies. The Lakers rolled into Miami, and the veterans planned an epic night out—music, celebrities, parties. Kobe agreed to come, more out of politeness than excitement. At the club, women swarmed him, but Kobe sat at the bar, polite but distant, sipping water.
After just a short while, he turned to his teammate. “I’m ready to go. I’ve got training at six.”
“But Kobe, this is Miami!”
He just shrugged. “Gotta train.”
So they drove him back to the hotel, leaving the party behind. The veterans were stunned. “I’ve never seen anyone leave a Miami party alone to train at dawn,” one would say later. “That was his mentality. For him, the workout was the party.”
Kobe’s dedication didn’t end there. On the road, he’d invite teammates to his room—not for games or gossip, but to watch tapes. Not just of Jordan or Magic, but of legends lesser known: Sidney Moncrief, Bernard King, World B. Free. He studied their footwork, their moves, their mentality.
“Coob knew them all,” a teammate recalled. “He wanted to know how every scorer got to the basket, how every legend found an edge.”
Kobe’s obsession was total. He’d train for hours, sleep, then train again. He wanted to know everything, to be everything. And he never let distractions pull him away.
There was a moment, late in Kobe’s rookie season, when he finally faced Michael Jordan on the court. There was no hype, no media circus—just two competitors locked in. Jordan, the master, and Kobe, the student, both relentless, both unyielding.
They played hard, trash talking and laughing, testing each other. After the game, Kobe asked Michael about his footwork, about his fadeaway, about how he attacked defenders. Michael smiled, recognizing the same fire he’d carried all those years.
“You want to be great?” he told Kobe. “You gotta outwork everyone. Every day. No excuses.”
Kobe nodded, absorbing every word.
Years passed. Michael retired, then returned. Kobe won championships, then more. But the stories from those practices—the intensity, the obsession, the refusal to accept anything less than perfection—became legend.
Veterans would tell rookies: If you want to be great, watch what they did. Watch how Michael made you want to quit, how Kobe left the party to train, how both of them lived for the grind, the process, the next challenge.
It wasn’t just talent. It was something deeper—a relentless pursuit, a willingness to sacrifice, a hunger that never faded.
And in empty gyms long after the lights dimmed, you could almost hear the echoes: the bounce of the ball, the swish of the net, and the quiet, unbreakable promise to never, ever settle for less than greatness.
Kobe Bryant’s teammate reveals how ‘intense’ his Michael Jordan obsession really was
Jordan always considered Bryant his ‘little brother’
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It’s no secret the late Kobe Bryant looked up to Michael Jordan. The two NBA legends shared a bond throughout their careers that carried on until Bryant’s tragic passing.
In a new documentary that’s coming out about Bryant, some of his former teammates would even call Bryant’s idolization of Jordan an obsession. He truly wanted to be like Mike.
“He was so intense on being like Michael, be better than Michael,” Bryant’s teammate Eddie Jones said.
Nick Van Exel also gave his Bryant-Jordan anecdote, saying that he lent highlight VHS tapes of Jordan to Bryant, who wanted to get his hands on anything
“Everything that MJ did, Kobe did, like chewing the gum, the walking, the moves, the footwork. I used to have VHS tapes back in the day full of highlights of Michael Jordan. Kobe asked to borrow them, and I’ve never seen those tapes again,” Van Exel said.
Much like Jordan, Van Exel said he immediately saw the “swag and confidence” that Bryant had at just 18 years old when he broke into the NBA.
Though many still believe Jordan to be the best player in NBA history, Bryant has been brought up in that conversation.
In 20 NBA seasons, Bryant collected 18 All-Star Game bids, including 17 straight from 1999 to his final year in 2015. He’s a five-time NBA champion with the Lakers, 15-time All-NBA selection, the 2007-08 MVP, two-time Finals MVP and two-time scoring champion, just to name a few accolades.
However, Jordan has Bryant beat by one ring, never losing in an NBA Finals series over his career. Jordan was also MVP of the league five times to Bryant’s one, though Bryant has him beat in All-NBA nods (Jordan had 11).
There’s no doubting the similarities in their game play, though, as Van Exel pointed out the mannerism even being the same let alone the moves on the court.
Jordan was a role model to many, but Bryant is his most accomplished in the NBA to date.
Jordan would speak at Bryant’s memorial in Los Angeles following his death and the death of his daughter, Gianna, in a helicopter accident.
“In the game of basketball, in life as a parent, Kobe left nothing in the tank. He left it all on the floor. Maybe it surprised people that Kobe and I were very close friends. But we were very close friends. Kobe was my dear friend, he was like a little brother. Everyone always wanted to talk about the comparison between he and I. I just wanted to talk about Kobe,” he said.
