As Neo from “The Matrix” would say, whoa. Kobe Bryant isn’t going to shoot the Los Angeles Lakers out of their first-half funk. No, he’s going to try and pass the Lakers into a record above .500, starting with 39 assists in the last three games — all wins — the most assists in a three-game span in his career. Yeah, it’s surprising. He had 11 Tuesday night in a five-point win over New Orleans that still didn’t instill much confidence in the Lakers as a whole, but showed Bryant can still mold his game to fill L.A.’s needs.

In post-game interviews he said the scorer-to-distributor transition really isn’t that hard  in possibly the quote of the year by using the perfect L.A./Hollywood connection. Take it away, ESPN LA’s Dave McMenamin:

Kobe on his ability to switch from shooting guard to point guard so easily: “I’m like Neo out this m—– f—–”

— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) January 30, 2013

OK, but humor us, Kobe, because for nearly 17 seasons it didn’t look like assisting — let alone on the fast break, which actually happened Tuesday — was part of your game. His shape-shifting playing style in this last week reminds me of some more dialogue from “The Matrix,” actually. Trinity (fans, media): “Neo… nobody has ever done this before.” Neo (Kobe): “That’s why it’s going to work.”

[RELATED: Kobe's Top 10 Bad-Ass Quotes Of The Season]

How long can Bryant play this role as a distributor?

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