Latest News, NBA / Sep 2, 2010 / 1:00 pm

Amar’e Stoudemire Told The Suns They Don’t Need Kobe

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Amar'e Stoudemire (photo. King Lawrence)

When you’re talking about building a team, even Amar’e Stoudemire believes in the importance of the point guard. After all, many believe it was two-time MVP Steve Nash that made Amar’e the player he is today. But when reminiscing with Paul Coro of The Arizona Republic yesterday, you might be surprised to hear that Stoudemire told the Suns’ brass after they traded away Stephon Marbury, Penny Hardaway and Tom Gugliotta during the 2003-04 season, he’d rather have Nash as his teammate than Kobe Bryant.

“The question ownership asked to me was, ‘Who do I want – Jason Kidd, Steve Nash or Kobe Bryant?’ I said Steve. Over Kobe. At the time, Kobe had a reputation for being selfish and Steve was the ultimate point guard. I felt like that’s what we needed. We had Joe Johnson and Shawn Marion. We just didn’t have a PG to control tempo. Kidd was banged up after microfracture (knee surgery).”

Now if you’ve never met Stoudemire, you don’t realize that he’s a straight-shooter. So when STAT says he told the Suns to pursue Nash instead of Kobe, he wasn’t kidding around. If you don’t remember the Summer of 2004, the free agent pool included Bryant, Nash, Manu Ginobili, Karl Malone and Rasheed Wallace, amongst others. And it took some spending on their behalf (a six-year package worth more than $65 million) to bring Nash back to Phoenix. For what it’s worth, Kobe’s contract with the Lakers was worth more than $136.4 million over seven years, and Kidd underwent microfracture surgery to repair a damaged knee on July 1, 2004.

What do you think? Would the Suns have been better off had they signed Kobe?

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  • Kyle

    Amare wanted to play with a true point guard, and I remember that he and the GM went and had dinner with Nash to get him to sign with Phoenix instead of Dallas. Few players get better when Nash leaves or when they leave Nash. Van Exel disappeared, Finley was old(and a ballhog at times so can’t count him), LaFrentz went from a decent 3 point shooting center to a bum, Marion couldn’t hit a 3 or rebound anymore, Tim Thomas was brought back from the dead for a huge contract… who are the others? Jim Jackson was part of their 7 man rotation, and he hit big shots with Nash. Only Dirk got better without Nash which is odd since their games go so well together. Oh, and Joe Johnson(but he said he realized how hard it is without playing with Nash.)

    Oh, there are also guys like Diaw, Raja Bell who aren’t half the player(injury or not)with Nash.

    I believe STAT said we need a point guard, Marbury is a ballhog who will never pass, and Nash with all of the young runners and gunners will make this a playoff team. Oh, and he understands the pick and roll as well as Malone and Dirk. Where is Q-Rich? Wasn’t he good with the Suns?

  • showtimeizback

    In hindsight, if you look at whats happened to Pau Gasol since he has joined Kobe, it kinda makes it clear that playing with Kobe may not have taken as much away from Amare as he would think.

    Number 1, Kobe was never really selfish, i would shoot the ball 25 times a game too if i had walton, smush, cook, odom and Kwame “hands” brown to pass to. People consider Pau Gasol to be the best big man in the league. He has improved dramatically from the time he got here to where he is now. All i byproduct of playing with Kobe.

    I think the real issue is where Gasol is a willing and eager student to learn from kobe and work equally as hard in practice and on both ends of the court, Amare isnt.

    Now, Amare has been quoted saying Kobe is the best player in the league, its not like he didnt respect his game. For him, it was more about stats i suppose.

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