I bet Kobe drinks Espresso.
No, not because he’s from Italy you racist. Because Kobe’s intense as hell and I bet he takes his coffee the same way.
Too often with Kobe we get caught up in the narrative surrounding him. He’s an Italian in America, he’s a cold-blooded killer, he’s a loner who can’t trust anyone. Too often perception of reality becomes more important than reality itself and the results could be damaging. Let’s go back to the Great Depression. I hope you guys are ready for a history lesson.
WWI influenced the world economy in three major ways. First, with the European economy staggering to recover, many European nations borrowed a disproportionate amount of money and ended up buying the majority of its resources from the US, causing an unprecedented flood of cash into the US economy.
Next, there was a dramatic expansion in US farmland to feed the starving European nations. When Europe finally recovered, US grain prices plummeted and farmers found themselves in debt.
Finally, by the time European industries had recovered, the US had claimed many of the world markets. This fueled intense competition for the remaining markets which was marked by high tariffs and increased prices.
These factors, instead of alerting Americans of the unstable world economy, created an illusion of prosperity. Americans felt on top of the economic world. Buying stocks became a hobby of sorts. Investors only had to pay 10% of the stocks actual cost and simply borrowed the rest from banks at 10 - 15% interest. This meant that for investors to break even, the stock market had to rise 10-15% every year. This created an tense atmosphere where investors constantly worried how high the market could rise. In October, the market crashed.
Investors were panicking. They all began selling their stocks at the same time, trying to salvage what remained of their once prosperous financial empire. In mere hours on Black Tuesday, millions of investors were ruined. Forty billion dollars had disappeared in under a week. Adjusting for inflation, that’s almost half a trillion dollars.
Kobe is the victim of a narrative that has been spun around him almost his entire life. Perhaps he is partially to blame for this. Perhaps he even encourages it. He certainly gets caught up in it sometimes. You see it in games sometimes. When the going gets tough, Kobe will get shooting. More often than not, it’s bad shot after bad shot and you wonder why he would shoot himself in the foot like this. He’s such an intense competitor you think he would realize that him shooting 40 shots isn’t the way to win ballgames.
Aside from what it has done to his basketball career, one wonders how this affects his personal life. People revere Kobe and I can tell you know there is a fine line between reverence and fear. Without a doubt, it must be difficult for people to grow close to him. How often does the intimidating, forbidding side of the Kobe Bryant narrative come between him and a healthy relationship?
Maybe I’m making too big a deal of this. Looking back, I do feel as if I’ve overdramatized it. But that is part of the stigma that surrounds Kobe Bryant; you’re almost forced to magnify the meaning.
This is an excerpt from my NBA blogspot blog, The6ixPack. I blog primarily about the Lakers and Bulls but no team is excluded. The majority of the posts will be humorous but I like to throw in more academic posts like this on occasion.
Thanks for reading, Pack
