Are you kidding? Talking about Kobe’s 1pt second half in Game 7, Ric Bucher just said something amazing, at least to me.

Their analysis of Kobe’s 1 pt second half effort was that he was making a point to his teammates and to the public about the criticism he got following game 6 about how many shots he took. So, he passed the ball more and was reluctant to take shots. Then Bucher said that he’d like to see a bit more maturity out of Kobe.

Are you kidding me? The time to make a statement to your team or to the press is before and after the game. During the game, your job is to give everything you can to win the game. You don’t do that during a game, especially during an all-or-nothing game 7.

This isn’t to criticize Kobe, though if this is true, it’s pretty awful. I’m shocked at how casually these commentators are talking about something that goes completely against the ethics of being a professional athlete. This is not something that you go, “oh, I wish he was a bit more mature about this.” It’s something you criticize and call out as unacceptable. So, if that’s their impression of the situation, I hope they would treat it with some seriousness.

(This aired on ESPN’s NBA show, but I’m speaking as a fan and not an employee.)