USA Basketball managing director Jerry Colangelo admitted the situation involving retiring Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant could force the organization to make an extremely tough decision ahead of the 2016 Summer Olympics.
Sam Amick of USA Today passed along comments from Colangelo about the various factors in play. He stated the possibility of including the two-time Olympic gold-medal winner on the 12-man roster is there, but it won't simply be handed to him:
When I was approached originally about Kobe's interest in potentially playing in the Olympics — this goes back early last summer, I guess, or spring — and the concept being that it would be great to end a career, win a gold medal and ride off into the sunset. That was just thrown my way by his agent, Rob Pelinka. I just took it in and I said, "Rob, I don't rule anyone out, but it has got to be based on performance because there's so many people who want (to be on the team) — everyone wants to be on the roster."
Colangelo said he later expressed the same outlook to Bryant, who responded by saying he didn't want any gifts and would do his best ...
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Article written by Tim Daniels
Jerry Colangelo Discusses Kobe Bryant, 2016 Olympic Team Selection and More
December 5th, 2015 by Tim Daniels Leave a reply »
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