I’ve sat through thousands and thousands of concerts, readings,
screenings, exhibits and shows of all kinds. An especially sublime
performance leaps out at you. It’s something you can feel in the air
even before the terrific perf
becomes tangible. And it has, for me, gotten to the point where I can
suss a landmark Kobe Bryant performance 20 yards away from the
television.

He's 29, and 29th on the all-time scoring list.
When the suburban Philadelpha product is done, he may well own all of
the scoring records and could also share the mark for championship team
memberships. Shielded by Shaq through the first portion of his career,
he’s now on track to win his own championships. (Most successful coach,
Phil Jackson, aside.) And he is, right up there with MJ, the best basketball player that I’ve ever seen.

Just
18 months ago that pronouncement would have been laughable. But anyone
who watched Bryant play on the U.S. team knows that if the guard merely
concentrates on defense he’s a game-changing presence. What’s more
Bryant has refined his shooting to such a degree that the likelihood of
success is perceptible even before he makes the shot. That’s not something that was regularly around during the rarified days of threatening the single-game scoring mark.

Truth is, Bryant is a much better player now. Take Wednesday’s perf into account. As I said, from the bar’s
far end, I could see that he had that killer stroke. By the end of the
first period the Lakers star had 20 points and he might have gone for
70. Instead, Bryant transformed himself into the Lakers' main
facilitator, spending much of the middle sessions passing the ball so
that key sidekicks could remain in the game’s flow. Bryant ended up
with 49 points — 19 in the final quarter — and 10 assists.

Now,
49 points (on 18 of 27 shooting) is one shy of the Kobester’s all-time
playoff high, but it's the 10 assists that make the total more
impressive than a scoring personal best. The Lakers showed a balance in
scoring that would otherwise not have been. This isn’t all directly
attributable to the team’s star player. (Remember how stilted the
ball-sharing played when Kwame Brown was at center? There was a shared
tentativeness that made the offense lurch, then sputter.) But when Luke
Walton is coming off the bench to score18, it’s obvious that some
defensive softening has been done.

Chris Paul still remains the
post’s season’s most aesthetically wonderful revelation. And Dwight
Howard is illuminating the future of post
play. It would be wrong, however, to miss a moment of what Bryant is
doing. Every single night he’s a threat to change the way you see the
sport. Perhaps he’ll even change the way you see sports in general. On
any given night, you can feel it coming.