With 40 seconds left he tried another from the top of the arc, and it fell short again. In the final seconds of regulation time he tried a mid-range jump shot to win the game, but got it so wrong he missed the rim entirely in overtime, he tried a three-pointer from out on the left, but it fell short too. ThereРІР‚в„ўs a famous story about a Lakers game against the Utah Jazz in May 1997, Game 5 of the second round of the play-offs. Maybe all those misses were just a natural consequence of playing so long. He smiled, and shrugged, and told them: РІР‚СљWell, IРІР‚в„ўm a shooting guard thatРІР‚в„ўs played for 19 years.РІР‚Сњ They asked Bryant how he felt about the record right after he broke it, when he missed a jump shot from 14 feet in the fourth quarter of a loss against the Memphis Grizzlies in 2014. Maybe if you know the sport better than I do it makes more sense that a great player could get it so wrong so often. He missed more shots than any other player in history, 14,481 altogether, more than 1,000 up on the man in second place, the Boston CelticsРІР‚в„ў John Havlicek. That one stat really stood out from the rest. What struck me, reading about his career now, wasnРІР‚в„ўt how often Bryant succeeded, but how often he failed.

There ought to be a word for the remorse you feel reading the obituaries of someone whose work you suddenly wish youРІР‚в„ўd followed more closely.

What IРІР‚в„ўm left is the regret that I didnРІР‚в„ўt pay more attention. There are plenty of experts who can explain his legacy for us. And there are people, like me, who are really only just beginning to appreciate them now. There are plenty of people who know them already, theyРІР‚в„ўre as familiar to them as Don BradmanРІР‚в„ўs batting averages are to cricket fans or Usain BoltРІР‚в„ўs world records are to athletics geeks. Caught short by the suddenness of his death, journalists used the stats to underpin their first sketches of Kobe BryantРІР‚в„ўs life, a shorthand to capture something of the magnitude of his achievements, and make them comprehensible to those of us who donРІР‚в„ўt follow basketball. And others too, 18 consecutive All Star appearances, 20 years with the Lakers, 39,283 career points, 57,278 career minutes, 122 40-point games, 25 50-point games, six 60-point games, one 81-point game. In the last couple of days weРІР‚в„ўve seen these numbers in the papers, heard them on the news bulletins. O ne regular season MVP award, two Olympic gold medals, three consecutive championships, four All-Star MVP awards, five championships in total.

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