Jeremy Lin spoke candidly about a falling out he had with Kobe Bryant when the two were teammates on the Los Angeles Lakers.
Lin spent one year on the Lakers during the 2014-15 season, which was Bryant’s penultimate season in the league. During a recent episode of Dwight Howard’s “Above the Rim” podcast, Lin dished on one incident that led Bryant to ice him out for several months.
The Taiwanese-American guard recalled a disagreement he had with Bryant during a late-game situation that year. Bryant was supposedly telling Lin to foul intentionally, while then-Lakers head coach Byron Scott urged Lin not to. The conflicting advice kept Lin from fouling right away.
Lin noticed Bryant display negative body language toward him over the incident, prompting the point guard to text his superstar teammate after the game.
“I texted him, ‘Hey man, I don’t appreciate the body language,’ Lin recounted to Howard. “And he came back with a sharp response, and I came back at him.
“It ended cordial, where I ended up saying, ‘I’m not saying you can’t teach me. You’re obviously a hundred times the player that I am. I want to learn anything and everything I can from you. I’m just asking if, could you just say and do it in a way that’s respectful to me as a man.'”
According to Lin, Bryant initially responded positively, saying he understood the message and even gave him specific areas to work on. Lin then revealed that Bryant didn’t speak to him “for the next five months.”
Lin shared that the two patched things up later on, and Bryant revealed he just wasn’t used to being challenged the way Lin did.
Lin told the story after Howard shared a similar experience he had with Bryant during the big man’s own ill-fated first run with the Lakers in the 2012-13 season. Bryant infamously gave Howard the silent treatment as the pair’s personalities clashed on and off the court.
