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playa2
Posts: 34922
Alba Posts: 15
Joined: 5/15/2003
Member: #407
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June 19, 2007
Amateur Video Is Latest in Bryant Drama
By HOWARD BECK
Kobe Bryant has not appeared on radio or television in three weeks. He is not even in the United States. But in the lull between a less-than-compelling N.B.A. finals and an intriguing draft, Bryant is again commandeering headlines, and the league’s attention, without saying a word.
First came a report that Bryant had publicly restated his trade request. Then came word of an amateur video in which Bryant profanely expressed his frustration with the Los Angeles Lakers.
The report proved to be inaccurate. The video, which could become public by the end of the week, could be damaging.
Bryant issued a public trade request May 30, in a series of radio interviews. That same day, he amplified his feelings in a posting on his Web site, KB24.com, writing that “the Lakers and me just have two different visions for the future.” That message was reposted Sunday, under a heading “June 17,” creating the impression that it was a new item. Bryant’s recycled comments became an Associated Press article, which made it instant national news. The item ran yesterday in The New York Times and was a top headline on ESPN.com.
It was unclear if Bryant’s comments were reposted to ratchet up pressure on the Lakers. Bryant is traveling in Europe with his family. Messages left with the Web site’s operators and Bryant’s agent, Rob Pelinka, were not returned.
By yesterday afternoon, the error had been discovered, and the story quickly changed. ESPN.com removed the article from its Web site. And KB24.com removed the statement. In its place were quotes, said to be from Bryant’s fans, expressing support for his trade request.
The next words heard from Bryant will also be several weeks old, and to many of his devoted admirers, perhaps shocking. An amateur video, said to have been taken in late May, shows Bryant viciously criticizing the team’s management and the franchise’s best young prospect, the 19-year-old center Andrew Bynum.
The men who shot the video have been peddling it to news media outlets for the last two weeks. A spokesman for the group said they intended to release the video by the end of the week, provided that it raises enough money through Web donations.
The men have remained anonymous — for fear of retribution from Lakers fans, they said — and identify themselves only as “The Kobe Video Guys.”
The footage appears to be legitimate, based on a shorter video posted on YouTube.com. The video’s owners played the entire 24-second clip for hoopsworld.com, which posted an article about it yesterday. The author, Eric Pincus, is a Los Angeles-based writer who has spent considerable time around the Lakers and Bryant. The video, Pincus writes, “leaves no doubt that it is in fact Bryant.”
The video’s owners played the clip over the telephone for a Times reporter. The voice is clearly Bryant’s, speaking in a high, agitated tone.
“It’s not the camera Kobe,” said a spokesman for the amateur videographers, who, like his friends, wanted to remain anonymous. He said the footage was shot in a shopping center parking lot in Newport Coast, Calif., where Bryant lives. The spokesman said his friends, all in their early 20s, were chatting with Bryant when one of them decided to take a photograph and some video for posterity, but that they did not believe that Bryant was aware that they were filming. The Lakers passed on a chance to obtain the Nets’ Jason Kidd in February because they would not part with Bynum.
“Are you kidding me?” Bryant says in the video. He goes on to say, with a number of profanities mixed in, that the Lakers should “ship out” Bynum.
“We’re talking about Jason Kidd,” Bryant says. He also speaks in a derisive tone about General Manager Mitch Kupchak before the video abruptly ends.
The video’s owners claim that a Lakers fan offered to buy the video to keep it private but that they declined. Instead, they intend to charge $1.99 through their Web site.
“I personally think we’re going to make more money this way,” the spokesman said. “I think people want to see it.” The Lakers are aware of the video but are declining to comment, said John Black, the team’s vice president for public relations.
Black confirmed that Bryant met with Jerry Buss, the team owner, in Spain last Friday. The substance of that conversation “will remain between the two of them,” Black said, but circumstances apparently have not changed. ESPN.com quoted Pelinka over the weekend as saying that Bryant stood by his trade request. The Lakers are standing by Buss’s previous statement that he will not trade Bryant.
JAMES DOLAN on Isiah : He's a good friend of mine and of the organization and I will continue to solicit his views. He will always have strong ties to me and the team.
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6/19/2007 12:53 PM