THE JOB'S NOT FINISHED, YOU HAVE WORK TO DO - Kobe Bryant Motivational Speech Compilation
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Get your personalized plan today at Noom.com. Real Noom users compensated to provide their story. In four weeks, the typical Noom user can expect to lose one to two pounds per week. Individual results may vary. You're up 2-0. What's the story? Are you not happy or you're only half happy? Instead of being happy about it. You're up 2-0. Job's not finished. Job finished? I don't think so. You want first place, come play with me. You want second place, go somewhere else. That's the first time it's come out of action.

I remember asking him why he couldn't just sit a game out because he was hurting. He said, what about the fans that saved up to watch me play just once? He never forgot about his fans. He loved you all so much.

I scored not a free throw, not a nothing, not a lucky shot, not a breakaway layup, zero points. I wasn't going to catch these kids in a week. I wasn't going to catch them in a year. So that's when I sat down and said, okay, this is going to take some thought. From there, I just went to work. I stayed with it. I kept practicing, kept practicing, kept practicing.

How the hell do you tolerate that kind of pain? You suck it up and play. I play games with the flu. I play games with 102 degree fever, man. You can't do that for 10. That is so powerful. You got to be on, man. We were playing against the Lakers, Tom. I said, no, I'm going to get there at 3 o'clock. Who do I see? I said, Kobe Bryant. Already working out. So I worked out for a good hour, hour and a half. And when I came off, after I was done, I sat down. And of course, I still heard the ball bouncing.

I look down, I'm like, this guy's still working out. He was working out. It looks like he was in a dead sweat when I got here. And he's still going. He's doing game moves. I'm like, I want to see how long this goes. I sit out there and watch. That game, he drops 40 on us. And after the game is over, I'm like, I have to ask this guy. I have to understand. So after the game is over, I'm like, hey, Cove, like,

why were you in the gym for so long? He's like, because I saw you come in. And I wanted you to know that it doesn't matter how hard you work, that I'm willing to work harder than you. Wow. Just like the shot clock going out, I would guess now. And it's right at the spot where Kobe Bryant passed Michael Jordan. So Andrew gets the honor of putting it down where Kobe Bryant scored those two free throws, Dave. I was born.

I wanted to be one of the best basketball players to ever play. Anything else that was outside of that lane, I didn't have time for. I played games with the flu. I played games with 102 degree fever, man. This obstacle cannot define me. It's not going to cripple me. It's not going to be responsible for me stepping away from the game that I love. I'm going to step away on my own terms. Because when I retire, I didn't want to have to say, "I wish I would have done more."

I would watch Magic play, I'd watch Michael play, and I would see them do these unbelievable things and I'd say, "You know, can I get to that level?" "I don't know, but let's find out." Who would Shaq be if he had your work ethic? He'd be the greatest of all time. If Shaq had your work ethic? He'd be the greatest of all time. Greatest of all time by a mile? Sure. He'd be the first to tell you that, for sure. I mean, this guy was a force like I have never seen. I mean, it was crazy.

You know, a guy at that size, generally guys at that size are a little timid and they don't want to be tall. They don't want to be big. Man, this dude was, he did not care. He was mean. He was nasty. He was competitive. He was vindictive. I mean, he was, yeah, I wish he was in a gym. I would have had 12 rings. Yeah, because I, listen, I don't, I don't deal with people that don't commit at that level.

but then act as if they do. I don't deal with that. I don't. You know, he would say, okay, Kobe's not throwing me the ball. And, you know, media would take it and run with it and all this other stuff. And I'm like, well, bruh, if you were in shape, by the time I run down on a fast break and run back and then run down, you're still coming down the first time, bruh. Like, what the hell do you want me to do? Right? So a lot of our

Contention came from that. And even though he was older, you were still confronting him. You didn't care. Oh, I didn't care. From day one? I knew for sure Rick Fox, my teammates, they all thought I was absolutely crazy the day me and Shaq got in the fist fight.

After that day, they were like, okay, Kobe, you're certifiable. Fist fight. I'm not backing down. Listen, there's a level of respect. And for Shaq, too, by the way. I know he's told me that that day was a big turning point for him because it was like he's generally used to

talking trash and saying what he wants and nobody really stepping up and challenging him on that. And when he saw me challenge him on that, he was like, this kid's crazy. All right, I can win with that. So at 13 years old, I had a kill list. And so, you know, they used to do these rankings. It was Street and Smith basketball rankings. And I was nowhere to be found because I was like 6'4", scrawny, like 160 pounds soaking wet.

So I was like 57 on the list. And so I will look at 56, 55, all the way up to number one, who these players are, what club teams they played for. So when we go on an AAU travel circuit, I got to hunt them down. Right. And so that became my mission in high school is to check off every other person, all those 56 other names, hunt them down and knock them down.

So like at 13 years old, I played the longer game because my game wasn't about being better than you at 13. It was to be better than you when, you know, the chips are really on the line. So when we played at 13, I would size you up and see what your strengths and weaknesses are. How do you approach the game? Are you silly about it? Are you goofy about it? Are you good at it just because you're bigger and stronger than everybody else? Or is there actually thought and skill that you put into it?

And when I'd play, I'd play to my weaknesses. I wouldn't play to my strengths. I'd play to my weaknesses. Because when you're playing summer basketball, there's so many games. So there's not a lot of skill work being done. So when are you going to get better? When you're playing in competition situations, you're only playing to your strengths. Why? Because you want to win. So what I would do, I was working on the things during those games that I was weak at. Left hand, pull up jump shot, post game. So I have a strategy.

So then fast forward to when I'm 17 and my game is completely well-rounded and that player at 13 that I saw at 13 is still doing the same at 17. Now you got a problem. That's right. Okay. I shot five air balls on national TV in front of millions of people. That cost us the series. And I'm 18. I'm fine, dude.

Well, you know, you got to look at the reality of the situation. You know, like for me, it's not, you know, you kind of got to get over yourself. It's not about you, man. Like, okay, you feel embarrassed. You're not that important. Get over yourself. That's where you go. Get over yourself, right? Like you're worried about how people may perceive you and like you're walking around and it's embarrassing because you shot five air balls. Get over yourself, right? And then after that, it's okay. Well, why did those air balls happen?

Got it. High school, year before, we played 35 games. Max. Right? Week in between. Spaced out. Plenty of time to rest. In the NBA, it's back to back to back to back to back to back to back. I didn't have the legs. So you look at the shot, every shot was on line. Every shot was on line, but every shot was short. Right? I got to get stronger. I got to train differently. The weight training program that I'm doing, I got to...

tailor it for an 82 game season so that when the playoffs come around my legs are stronger and that ball gets there. So I look at it with rationale and say okay well the reason why I shot air balls is because my legs aren't there. I go well next year they'll be there. That was it. Done. Done. We had a game against Toronto in 2000 and Vince was tearing the league up. My back was jacked. Jacked. But like the perception of that like what?

Kobe's missing the game against Toronto and Vince Carter because my back was really spasming. But people will be like, what? Oh, he's ducking Vince. Excuse me? No, I don't think so. So I would be in a layup line like, okay, there's a lot of days where you can rest and recover. Today ain't one of them. Your back can bother you any other day. That ain't bothering me today. He gonna have to see me today. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen

You're playing against the Golden State Warriors. Score is 107-109. You guys are close to getting into the playoffs. You know exactly what happens in the game. You go up, you're about to take your shot, and then all of a sudden, boom. Achilles happens, right? Friend of mine, Nima, he is here just to listen to you. He played ball.

And he told me, he says, Patrick, I don't think you understand. He says, when I tore my Achilles in high school, he says, four friends of mine dragged me to my hospital. I was crying from there straight to the hospital. He says, I have no clue how the hell this guy did it. He went and hit the free throws and then you walked off the stage. Yeah. And then you got the surgery done. Yeah. How the hell do you tolerate that kind of pain?

You know, I tell this example and I think this is the best way to explain it. You know, you have a hamstring injury, you pull your hamstring really, really badly, you can barely walk, right? Let alone play anything. Soccer, basketball, volleyball, whatever it is, you can't do anything. You're at home, all of a sudden a fire breaks out in the home, right? Your kids are upstairs,

Wife is, wherever she may be, it's going down. Willing to bet that you're gonna forget about your hamstring, you're gonna sprint upstairs, you're gonna grab your kids, you're gonna make sure your wife's good, you're getting out of that house. The lives of your family are more important than the injury of your hamstring. And so when the game is more important than the injury itself, you don't feel that. But you go into the locker room, and then one of the reporters comes up to you,

And he says to you, "Kobe, are you convinced that they told you it's probably torn Achilles? They're gonna do an MRI. Are you pretty convinced that's what it is?" And your answer is, "Yeah." Then one of the reporters says, "But if anyone is gonna get through this, it's probably you, right?" You put your head down and you say, "Oh, man, sh--." Wow. Dude, Achilles were like the kiss of death for athletes. Like, "I don't know."

If I can do this, I don't know. There's so many factors. There's the surgery that has to take place. The surgery has to go well. Right. And then just it's a tendon. I'm not dealing with anything that's muscular, things that I can control. I can't control a tendon. You know what I'm saying? So like, I don't know. And then thinking about what that process of recovery is going to look like. It's a long one. Do I want to do that shit? I don't I don't I don't know if I want to do it. I don't know. So that was the hardest part.

You don't know if you want to do it or you don't know if you are going to be able to come back from it. Both. I don't know if I can do it. I don't know if I want to do it. Got it. It's a long, long process. But like when I went in the trainer's room, my kids are in there and, you know, they're looking at you and stuff. And I'm looking at them and I'm like, you know, it's all right. Dad's going to be all right. It'll be fine. It'll be all right. It'll be all right. It'll be all right. As a parent, you got to set the example.

You gotta set the example. This is another obstacle. This obstacle cannot define me. It's not gonna cripple me. It's not gonna be responsible for me stepping away from the game that I love. I'm gonna step away on my own terms. And that's when the decision was made that, you know what? I'm doing it. I'm doing it. You're a freaking beast, man. The day could be today that your career's over. Now what do you do? I said, I better get to work. Rest at the end, not in the middle.

And that's something I always live by. I'm not going to rest. I'm going to keep on pushing now. There are a lot of answers that I don't have. Even questions that I don't have. But I'm just going to keep going. I'm just going to keep going. And I'll figure these things out as you go. And you just continue to build that way. So I try to live by that all the time. Have a dream. Sacrifice for it. And never, ever rest in the middle. When I came into the NBA, I was like, baby, these things really don't work that hard.

One of the things I would do is, while everybody would be at the cafeteria, work, you know, eating and doing all sorts of stuff, I'd just go back to the gym. I'd go back to the gym. How can I show you that, no, I have the energy? Well, you do it through training, right? So when I get up in the morning, my daughter goes with me. 4 a.m.? 4 a.m. My 15-year-old goes with me. She goes with me before school, and it becomes a daddy-daughter thing. That's cool. Through that process, she understands the value of hard work. And so it's through those behaviors is where I find the motivation to do it. Mm-hmm.

I think the definition of greatness is to inspire the people next to you. I think that's what greatness is or should be. It's not something that lives and dies with one person. It's how can you inspire a person to then in turn inspire another person, and then inspires another person. And that's how you create something that I think lasts forever. It's not sit around and it's all happy-go-lucky type of thing. If you're a leader, your job is to get the best out of people.

You gotta deal with it. Face it, learn from it. It's exciting when you win, it's exciting when you lose, because the process should be exactly the same. But the hardest thing is to face that stuff. But what if today is the day that you, that's it. Now what do you do? What can I say? Mamba out. My parents were great. Growing up, they instilled in me the importance of imagination, of curiosity.

And understanding that, okay, if you want to accomplish something, I'm not just going to sit here and say, yes, you can do whatever you want. Yes, you can. You have to also put in the work to get there. Right? So they taught me that at a really early age, man. And when you grow up as a kid thinking that the world is your oyster, all things are possible if you put in the work to do it, you grow up having that fundamental belief.

Who was more influential for you, your father or mother? Both were influential at different points. My mom was there on a daily basis. My father was really influential at a really critical time where I had a summer where I played basketball when I was like 10 or 11 years old. And here I come playing and I don't score one point.

The entire summer. Not one. You didn't score once? Not one. Were you in the game? I was in the game. How did you not score? Because I was terrible. Not a free throw, not a nothing, not a lucky shot, not a breakaway layup, zero points. I remember crying about it and being upset about it. My father just gave me a hug and said, listen, whether you score zero or score 60, I'm going to love you no matter what. Wow. That is the most important thing that you can say to yourself. Because from there, I was like, okay, that gives me all the confidence in the world to fail.

I have the security there. But, to hell with that, I'm scoring 60. Let's go. Right, right. And from there, I just went to work. I stayed with it. I kept practicing, kept practicing, kept practicing. I think that's when the idea of understanding a long-term view became important. Because I wasn't going to catch these kids in a week. I wasn't going to catch them in a year. So that's when I sat down and said, okay, this is going to take some thought.

What do I want to work on first? Shooting. Let's knock this out. Let's focus on this half a year, six months, do nothing but shoot. After that, creating your own shot. So I started creating a menu of things. When I came back the next summer, I was a little bit better. Then 14 came around, back half of 13, 14 years old, and then I was just killing everyone. And it happened in two years. And I wasn't expecting it to happen in two years, but it did because what I had to do was work on the basics and the fundamentals.

but they relied on their athleticism and their natural ability. And because I stick to the fundamentals, it just caught up to me. And then my body, you know, my knees stopped hurting. I grew into my frame. Then your athleticism, once you have the fundamentals, the hard work, the mindset, and you tack on the athleticism, it's game over. Then it was game over. Wow. The love of the game, the challenge. Like, I would watch Magic play, I'd watch Michael play, and I would see them do these unbelievable things, and I'd say, you know...

Can I get to that level? I don't know, but let's find out. Let's find out. And so that curiosity to see where I could push this thing led me down that path, I think. With the 13th pick in the 1996 NBA Draft, the Charlotte Hornets select Kobe Bryant from Lower Merion High School in Pennsylvania. Greatness lies ahead for this young man. Well, I learned that you have to work hard and you have to approach the game with a serious mindset.

There was a stretch in '03 where Shaq was out with an injury and Phil called me up to his office and said, "Okay, we need you to really turn on the afterburners and start scoring ball if you have to play." So I did and I wound up scoring, I think it was nine straight games, 40 plus points. - Nine straight? - Nine straight games. And then Shaq comes back second to last game of that. And then Phil called him to his office and said, "Cole, okay, I need you to dial it back."

I'm like, why? Like, we're winning. I don't understand. It's because our goal is to win a championship. But if you continue to do this, we'll lose Shaq. We'll lose him. His motivation, his excitement. What triggers him, right? So I need you to pull back so we can pull Shaq forward for June. I mean, that was the big challenge, is you move from, you know, being the single dominant player to understanding, okay, I have to help these other guys. Go ahead and lift everyone else up. It's tough.

It's more like you put yourself to the side and you put yourself in their shoes and understand what they're feeling. And then you have to make certain decisions of, okay, what buttons do I need to push for this player to get them to the next level? So it's never, it's not sit around and it's all happy or lucky time. The leader, your job is to get the best out of them. Even if...

They may not like it at that time. He was very demanding because he expected everyone to put in the same effort as he was. And that was unrealistic. You're not behind me. You're not in front of me. You're right there parallel with me. Practice was very competitive right away. You know how Kobe is. He was jawing. We had it going sometimes. He didn't let me slip a lot. Times where I get ejected or about to get a technical foul or going off the deep end, he would be there to...

you know, set me straight a lot, which helped me a lot. So we get into the top mountain, he's like, "Hey, hey, uh, hey, I'm open." I'm like, "Okay." And so we go out and same thing, he comes, "Hey, hey, hey, I'm open." "Okay." There you go. Come back in, "Hey, dude, you gotta throw me the ball." I said, "Man, fuck that. Get it off the rebound if I miss, bro." Listen, I don't deal with people that don't commit at that level, but then act as if they do. The running joke.

He doesn't pass and all that sort of crap. That's okay. I'll take those five. I'll take five. Those times when you get up early and you work hard. Those times when you stay up late and you work hard. Those times when you don't feel like working. You're too tired. You don't want to push yourself, but you do it anyway. That is actually the dream. That's the dream. It's not the destination. It's the journey.

And if you guys can understand that, then what you'll see happen is that you won't accomplish your dreams. Your dreams won't come true. Something greater will. It's an amazing thing about passion. If you love something, if you have a strong passion for something, you would go to the extreme to try to understand or try to get it. Whatever you have a love for, if you have to walk, you would go get it.

If you have to beg someone, you will go get them. I don't think you guys understand how present you guys were with me. You know, you guys were there with me at 5.30 in the morning when I was running the track and I was midway through my workout. And I didn't know if I could make it through. And I thought about the expectations you guys had for me and you had for our team. And it pushed me through. It got me through those 800s and 400s and 100s at 5.30 in the morning. So I thank you.

We're not on this stage just because of talent or ability. We're up here because of 4AM. We're up here because of two-a-days or five-a-days. We're up here because we had a dream and let nothing stand in our way. If anything tried to bring us down, we used it to make us strong. We were never satisfied, never finished, we'll never be retired.

My high school English teacher, Mr. Fisk, he had this beautiful quote and it read, "Rest at the end, not in the middle." And I took that to heart. I believe there's time for resting at the end, but for me, that time is not now. Thank you for this tremendous honor in acknowledging my basketball career, but I'm far from done. My next dream is to be honored one day for inspiring the next generation of athletes to have a dream, sacrifice for it, and never ever rest in the middle.

Rest at the end, not in the middle. Be yourself. That's it. Be you. Be you. There's no gimmick. There's no contriving thing. Who are you? Where are you today? What is your story? Where does that come from? And if you guys can understand that, then I'm doing my job as a father. Thank you guys so much. I love you. Mamba out.

Because if you play with the fear of failing, you'll have the pressure on yourself to play, you know, to capitulate to that fear. If you play with the sense of "I want to win, I want to win," then you have the fear of what happens if you don't. But if you find common ground in the middle, in the center, then it doesn't matter. You're unfazed by either, right? And that enables you to really just stay in the moment, stay connected to it, and not feel anything other than what's in front of you. So, you know, I try to just be dead center. You start with what do you want your game to be?

What would make your game most unstoppable or hard to deal with? And now you work backwards from there. And you start building it one piece at a time, one move at a time, one counter at a time. Who would Shaq be if he had your work ethic? He'd be the greatest of all time. If Shaq had your work ethic? He'd be the greatest of all time. Greatest of all time by a mile. Sure. He'd be the first to tell you that. For sure. I mean, this guy was a force like I have never seen. I mean, it was crazy.

You know, a guy at that size, generally guys at that size are a little timid and they don't want to be tall. They don't want to be big. Man, this dude was, he did not care. He was mean. He was nasty. He was competitive. He was vindictive. I mean, he was, yeah, I wish he was in the gym. I would have had 12 rings. He had the work ethic. My God, yeah. Yeah.

We didn't be close. If you're lazy, man, I don't want to talk to you. I don't want to deal with you. You're going to make me feel dumber. You know, you're going to lower my level. I don't think so. You can go over there. There's plenty of teams in here where you'll fit right in. I don't deal with people that don't commit at that level, but then act as if they do.

I don't deal with that. I don't. It's real shit. I mean, listen. So, like, we used to get into stuff all the time because it was like, you know, he would say, okay, Kobe's not throwing me the ball. And, you know, media would take it and run with it and all this other stuff. And I'm like, well, bruh, if you were in shape, by the time I run down on a fast break and run back and then run down, you're still coming down the first time, bruh. Like, what the hell do you want me to do? Right? So, a lot of our...

Contention came from that. And even though he was older, you were still confronting him. You didn't care. Oh, I didn't care. From day one? I knew for sure Rick Fox, my teammates, they all thought I was absolutely crazy the day me and Shaq got in the fist fight. After that day, they were like, okay, Kobe, you're certifiable.

Fist fight. Oh, yeah. Fist fight. I'm not backing down. Listen, either you want to whoop my ass or we want to have a night. But, you know, there's a level of respect. And for Shaq, too, by the way. I know he's told me that that day was a big turning point for him because it was like, you know, he's generally used to

talking trash and saying what he wants and nobody really stepping up and challenging him on that. And when he saw me challenge him on that, he was like, this kid's crazy. All right, I can win with that. You know? And so that was kind of the beginning of our relationship, I think. That's probably never happened to him. That's probably not something that's common to him. No. I mean, he's seven feet tall since he was three years old or something, right? There was a lot.

This is all coming back to me right now. This also came in Phoenix. My first year we were playing and he kept posting up, but they kept fouling him. So he kept going to the free throw line and kept missing him. And so he throw the ball out to me. I'm not throwing that back in there. So I kept shooting him, right? So we get into timeout. He's like, hey, hey, hey, I'm open. I'm like, okay.

And so we go out and same thing. Hey, I'm open. Okay. Come back in. Hey, dude, you got to throw me the ball. I said, man, get it off the rebound if I miss, bro. You told him this. First year. 18 years old, man. 18 years old. I must have been out of my damn mind. The story continues. The story continues. So if you fail on Monday, the only way it's a failure on Monday is if you decide to not progress from that.

Right? So to me, that's why failure is non-existent. Because if I fail today, okay, I'm going to learn something from that failure and I'm going to try again on Tuesday. Those times when you don't feel like working, you're too tired, you don't want to push yourself, but you do it anyway. That's the dream. It's not the destination. It's the journey.

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