Kobe Bryant is considered to be a Los Angeles Lakers god. His journey to five NBA championships has been well documented and he has gone on to win an Oscar for the best animated short film with ‘Dear Basketball’ after his retirement from the game.
Bryant now runs a sports academy by the name of ‘Mamba Sports Academy’ with some of the finest NBA superstars like Kyrie Irving, Paul George and Kawhi Leonard visiting his institution to get some hoops during the off season (free publicity!).
However, there exists a dark stain on Kobe’s illustrious career that even though he wasn’t found guilty for, will continue to be attached to his name and his legacy forever.
In 2003, Bryant was accused of rape by a 19-year-old woman who was a staffer of a hotel Bryant stayed in during one of his surgeries. While No. 24 did accept having a sexual encounter with the woman, he denied the assault allegations.
Even though the case was settled outside of the court, Bryant had to publicly apologise for adultery while pleading innocence in the rape case.
However, in a recent podcast called ‘Book of Basketball 2.0’ hosted by Bill Simmons with Zach Lowe as special guest, it was revealed that while the trial was going on, Bryant went on to throw his then teammate Shaquille O’Neal under the bus saying that O’Neal would have paid his women to keep their lips sealed under such circumstances.
According to a 2004 Los Angeles Times report, Bryant told Det. Doug Winters and Det. Dan Loya that Shaq had paid around $1 million to multiple women to not say anything about such issues.
“Bryant made a comment to us about what another teammate does in situations like these,” Winters wrote in a report. “Bryant stated he should have done what Shaq (Shaquille O’Neal) does. Bryant stated that Shaq would pay his women not to say anything. He stated Shaq has paid up to a million dollars already for situations like this. He stated he, Bryant, treats a woman with respect, therefore they shouldn’t say anything.”
Although according to the LA Times report, O’Neal got to know about these comments in September 2003, nearly two months afterwards, however, Lowe revealed on the podcast that O’Neal knew about it from the beginning.
Shaq’s agent, Perry Rogers told the media that the statement made by Bryant were false and “undeserving of a response.”
“It didn’t have any impact on the relationship,” Rogers said, “because Shaquille had a very professional approach to his career there and because he has had an understanding of Kobe, Kobe’s interests and Kobe’s priorities. Kobe has historically been shown to be interested in one person and one person alone,” Rogers said.
However, the relationship between Shaq and Kobe was never a nice one and there have been various reports to support that argument as well. Many believe that even though the two dug their animosities and became friends again during the NBA on TNT interview, Shaq continues to dislike the Mamba for those words.
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