Pau Gasol is brimming with anticipation.
He can’t wait to hear the roar of nearly 19,000 fans as his No. 16 Lakers jersey is lifted into the Crypto.com Arena rafters during halftime of Tuesday’s game against the Memphis Grizzlies.
“Highlight of my career? I think it’s the highlight of my life, this moment that we’re about to experience,” Gasol told FOX Sports on Monday at a Gasol Foundation event to reduce childhood obesity. “Having my jersey retired and receiving this honor and being with that group of people and incredible achievers, legends, it’s something I could’ve never imagined.”
While Gasol never anticipated this moment, it’s something former teammate Kobe Bryant knew would come.
A video recently resurfaced showing Bryant five years ago, ahead of winning an Oscar in 2018, saying how much Gasol meant to him. “Pau, when he retires, he will have his number in the rafters next to mine,” he said. “The reality is I don’t win those championships without Pau. The city of L.A. doesn’t have those two championships without Pau Gasol.”
For both Gasol and Bryant, their success was inextricably intertwined. In fact, Gasol views his jersey retirement ceremony Tuesday as not only a celebration of his greatness, but as a celebration of their greatness.
“He elevated me,” Gasol said of Bryant, who died in a 2020 helicopter crash alongside his daughter, Gianna, and seven others. “He made me better as a player. He showed me what it took to be a better leader and one of the best, if not the best player on the floor. The attitude, the mindset, the approach, how hard he worked for it, how badly he wanted it. He set the tone and it was up to you whether you wanted to be on that train and that path – or that was not something for you and you’ve got to get off.”
‘He wanted to be successful in every category’
Pau Gasol opens up to Melissa Rohlin about the biggest thing he learned from Kobe Bryant as a member of the Los Angeles Lakers, how he wants to be remembered as an NBA player, & reveals how he feels being left off the NBA’s ’75 Greatest Players’ list.
Gasol accepted the challenge. And while Bryant famously had an adversarial relationship with many of his teammates who were turned off by his infamous intensity and bluntness, that wasn’t the case for Gasol. The opera-loving, avid-reading Spaniard somehow understood Bryant – and harnessed his ferocity to his advantage.
The most notable example was following…
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