Kobe Hypes Up Iggy

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>LOS ANGELES - Andre Iguodala obviously had his reasons. He walked away from an offered contract extension worth about $57 million. He must have believed deeply in those reasons.

The 76ers' wing player, the centerpiece of his team's offense and probably its best defender, shares an agent with the Los Angeles Lakers' Kobe Bryant, arguably the NBA's best player. As far back as last season's All-Star Game in Las Vegas, Bryant spoke glowingly of Iguodala and his potential.

Bryant, though, does not judge Iguodala's decision to become a restricted free agent this summer.

"It's a business, and, like any other business, you can believe that your value can be greater," Bryant said before the Lakers faced the Sixers last night at the Staples Center.

"I've talked to him . . . I said, 'You have to be able to prove that you can command that top dollar, that you can do what they said you can't do. Just go out and play. If there's a team out there that feels you can command that value, then you'll get it.'

"But you can't take [the situation] as something personal or let it distract you from working hard every single day. You have to come out and perform."

Iguodala has been able to do that most nights. He put up a season-high 30 points in Wednesday night's 110-107 loss to the Utah Jazz in Salt Lake City. He has an ability to fill up most columns of the box score. At the same time, the Sixers entered last night's game with a 14-18 record; scouts, personnel specialists and general managers tend to be skeptical of impressive individual numbers with non-winning teams. But they also like players they think have an upside.

The Sixers and the Lakers meet only twice a season, but Bryant got a closer, more intense view of Iguodala while training with the U.S. National Team last summer. Iguodala was part of the select group of younger players who practiced with and scrimmaged against the team as it prepared for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

"He has a lot [of upside]," Bryant said. "Just on the surface, his athleticism stands out.

"In a league crowded with athletic players, he's at the top of the list with some others. I also like his ability to handle the ball at his size, to create opportunities for others and to defend. That's a combination that's tough to find in the league nowadays. He gets after it on the perimeter, he's a good post player, he creates for others; that's tough to find."

The Sixers, having acquired the expiring contract of Gordan Giricek from the Jazz in last weekend's deal for Kyle Korver, have about $10 million in salary-cap space to use this summer in free agency and the trade market. Whether they will make an offer similar to the last one to Iguodala is problematical; another team is unlikely to be in position - or willing - to offer him a lucrative enough package to cause the Sixers to decline to match it.

Still, Iguodala is not necessarily viewed as a projected franchise player on a contending team.

"He's got the talent to be that," Bryant said. "That's nothing but responding to the challenge of taking over your situation, believing 'The team wins and loses with me,' believing 'These are my decisions, these are my teammates and I have to try and make them better.'

"It's a mentality, although it's a little different for him because he had been playing with [the dominant] Allen Iverson. It's tough to kind of make that switch, to go into that mode. It's difficult."

Bryant fills that role with the Lakers. He has gone from creating waves about wanting to be traded to believing his current team can be among the elite in the Western Conference to challenging for a championship. If that sounds like a reach for a team that entered last night 19-11, still stinging from a 110-91, Dec. 30 home loss to the Boston Celtics, Bryant made it sound as if it had been a trigger point. He calls this season's Lakers team "the closest" on which he has played.

Last night's challenge was a bit more difficult, with Lakers starting forward Lamar Odom sitting out a one-game suspension for a flagrant foul against the Celtics' Ray Allen.

"Put [the loss to the Celtics] behind you, use it as motivation, try to kind of redeem ourselves," Bryant said. "But we want to continue to move forward. We don't hang our heads, get discouraged. We just keep plugging."</div>

Source: Philly.com

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Answer_AI03 @ Jan 7 2008, 02:18 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Iggys a great player and hes only going to continue to get better. I still think his overall aggression is in question but the talent is definitely there. I wonder what it would be like if he and Kobe were on the same team?</div>

Then you could arguably have a true Jordan-Pippen comparison. Iggy had the task of defending Kobe all summer in the Team USA practices and Kobe has been working with him on his game. They share the same agent as well.