Houston, TX, USA; Los Angeles Lakers forward Kobe Bryant (24) reacts after scoring a basket during the second quarter against the Houston Rockets at Toyota Center. Mandatory Credit: Troy Taormina-USA TODAY Sports
Mandatory Credit: Troy Taormina-USA TODAY Sports
The late, great Kobe Bryant earned a reputation for not being the nicest teammate during his storied 20-year career with the Los Angeles Lakers. Bryant was infamously hard on his teammates, but former NBA player Nick Young revealed on the Club Shay Shay podcast that he had another side to him.
When host Shannon Sharpe asked Young about Bryant being hard on him during their three seasons together on the Lakers, he shared how the icon once threw a stripper party for them.
“Yeah, he was,” Young said. “But Kobe was cool though. People don’t know, the beginning of the season, Kobe have like a party for the team to get together. Had a stripper party. Yeah, like a little stripper party. But he taught me a little bit of swag ’cause he had had a party, had the bottles and the girls come, and then he’ll leave.
“You just won’t see Kobe no more,” Young continued. “… So we eat, and he’s like, ‘Man, I got y’all a little something something.’ We go upstairs. We see the strippers and stuff. And then Kobe was like, ‘Y’all have fun,’ and leave out. I was like, ‘Man, thank you.’ That’s swag though. Thank you. I learned… That’s a little swag, but thank you. I’ll take the one you want.”
Bryant and Young were teammates from 2013 to 2016. The former was married with two daughters at the time, and staying at the stripper party might not have been the smartest idea.
Bryant’s wife, Vanessa Bryant, had filed for divorce in 2011, citing irreconcilable differences. TMZ reported at the time that he had cheated on her multiple times, and a recent affair pushed her over the edge. Bryant desperately wanted them to stay together, and the divorce would get called off in January 2013. You’d imagine he wouldn’t have wanted to upset her in any way after that.
Young, the No. 16 pick in the 2007 NBA Draft, and those Lakers players certainly weren’t upset about this party, though. The 41-year-old evidently had a great time.
Young also enjoyed being Bryant’s teammate, for the most part. It wasn’t a very successful time for the Lakers, though. They missed the playoffs in the three seasons that Bryant and Young were teammates. You can’t blame the former for that, however.
Bryant missed significant time with injury in his last three seasons with the Lakers. He finally retired in 2016 and went on to have two more daughters with Vanessa. Tragically, Bryant and his second-eldest daughter, Gianna Bryant, both passed away in a helicopter accident on Jan. 26, 2020.