Throughout his Los Angeles Lakers career, Kobe Bryant has faced constant comparisons to Chicago Bulls legend Michael Jordan.
While Kobe was able to match Jordan in a lot of ways, one place where he has fallen short is championships. After winning his fifth in 2010, Kobe was never able to get his sixth to catch Jordan.
Kobe has always said that championships are the most important thing to him, but according to Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times, Kobe is just fine with having only five rings:
Kobe says he's OK with not winning 6th ring: "Listen, I worked as hard as I (expletive) could. I did everything I could. I'm fine with that"
— Mike Bresnahan (@Mike_Bresnahan) December 5, 2015
Kobe obviously wanted to win more rings, and the two NBA Finals losses in 2004 and 2008 surely stand out to him as missed opportunities. However, Kobe is right in that he did everything he could to get a sixth ring and sometimes it just isn’t meant to be.
Many players are lucky to get one championship in their career and many of the all-time greats like Elgin Baylor, Charles Barkley, and Reggie Miller never were able to get one. For Kobe to have five in his collection is proof of his outstanding career.
Kobe put everything he had into his career and the result was five championships. Though he hoped to get more, he can still stand tall with all of his accomplishments in his storied career.