39 points and 37 shot attempts -- that was what Kobe Bryant accomplished on November 4, Tuesday night, in the Lakers' game against the Phoenix Suns.
The Lakers superstar led the team to their fifth loss of the season after the Suns overcame his shooting frenzy with a final score of 112-106. The Los Angeles Lakers are now winless at 0-5.
In a report by Sports Illustrated, Bryant made only 14 out of 37 field goal attempts. The Lakers continue to do terribly in terms of offense, being No. 16 in the league, as well as defense. Although they might become the worst NBA team of all-time, they are looking to contend with the Philadelphia 76ers as being the worst team in the current NBA season. Things do not look better in the next two weeks as they face heavyweights such as the San Antonio Spurs, Golden State Warriors and Memphis Grizzlies.
USA Today wrote that Kobe misses more shots than 99% of attempts in the NBA. He averaged 27.6 points per game in the Lakers' last five outings, No. 2 overall in the league after Klay Thompson. However, Bryant has been shooting too much to reach such average. He is 49 of 122 attempts. Other comparable players include Carmelo Anthony with 34 of 75, Blake Griffin with 41 of 82 and James Harden with 31 of 80.
Slam Online wrote that the last time Kobe shot that many or more was in December 2012 against the Golden State Warriors with 41 attempts. On November 4, he missed 23 shots while the rest of the Lakers' starting four missed 20 together. Furthermore, Kobe only had a lone assist in 44 minutes of playing.
Bryant said after the game in the Slam Online report, "I was just being aggressive, playing with a lot of energy tonight. It's easy to look at it and say, '37 shots,' but you don't see how hard I was working to get easy opportunities. When you play with a lot of energy and you're winless, you'll get a lot of opportunities."
Lakers coach Byron Scott said, "If you look at the next three games, he's not going to be playing 44 minutes. I'll taper back his minutes. As far as him carrying the load, he's going to do whatever he thinks he has to do to win the game."
Based on an ESPN report, Bryant is 25 missed shots away from tying for most misses in a career. He missed 13,369 shots in 1,250 games. In the last five games, his missed shots averaged 14.6 per game.