The Wizard of West: Kobe’s Best Still Coming

Jerry West, who has always had a keen eye for appraising talent--previously for the Lakers and now for the Memphis Grizzlies--assessing Kobe Bryant in an interview with Johnette Howard of Newsday: “He’s a smiling assassin. I think he’s the most skilled player in the league, for sure.... Nothing Kobe would achieve would surprise me. Nothing.... He’s one of the most determined people I’ve ever seen.”

West added that Bryant’s ascent is not even close to peaking. “At that age [23], it’s like watching a precocious child. Some kids do startling things. And you look and say, ‘My goodness, what is this person going to be when he gets older?’”

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More Bryant: J. Freedom du Lac of the Sacramento Bee on the food poisoning suffered by Kobe: “You can’t stop [him]; you can only hope to contaminate him.”

Tom FitzGerald of the San Francisco Chronicle, commenting on the “killer bacon cheeseburger”: “You mean to tell me that [Kobe] doesn’t have a food tester in his posse?”

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Trivia time: Tiger Woods will be seeking to win the Memorial tournament in Dublin, Ohio, for the fourth consecutive year. Who was the last player to win the same PGA tournament four years in a row?

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Dissing Sir Charles: Jerry Greene of the Orlando Sentinel suggests some names for the upcoming hurricane season. A sampling:

* “Hurricane Barkley--Talk about a big bag of wind.

* “Hurricane Eldrick--A Tiger of a storm.

“Hurricane Hardaway--Lands in Orlando and nobody cares.”

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Dissing the East: Keith Olbermann of ABC radio: “The Nets and Celtics couldn’t beat L.A. if they merged.”

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Pay attention: “Learn as if you’re going to live forever. Live as if you’re going to die tomorrow.”

Some wisdom from a 91-year-old former coach. The name? John Wooden.

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Looking back: On this day in 1987, Seattle’s Xavier McDaniel set an opponent’s playoff record against the Lakers with 20 field goals. Nonetheless, the Lakers won, 122-121.

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Avalanche of criticism: Looking back at the San Jose Sharks’ season, in the Sporting News’ Caught on the Fly column: “Aside from muttering shoulda/woulda/coulda [‘We were the better team, right? Right?’], the Sharks have a busy summer of trying to figure out what to do with a certain free agent [and we’re not talking Gary Suter]. An oh-fense lacking punch needs Teemu Selanne in a big way, but that Game 7 disappearing act, not to mention gettin’ shown up by Peter Forsberg all series long, has San Jose suits thinking that $9 mil per is a tad high.”

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Trivia answer: Walter Hagen, who won the PGA Championship from 1924 to 1927.

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And finally: John McGrath of the Tacoma News Tribune, on Ryan Leaf, who is trying to salvage his career with the Seattle Seahawks: “Consider the irony: [Leaf] had everything a pro athlete could need but discipline and direction. When he matured to the point he actually decided to watch his weight in the off-season, he learned a most precious mechanism--the wrist on his throwing hand--had sustained damage that accurately might be called irreparable.”