Rip Hamilton on How He Almost Got Traded for Kobe Bryant: "It Was Close to Happening"

Kobe Bryant could be ending his career with the Pistons right now.

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Complex Original

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For years now, there’s been a rumor floating around about how Kobe Bryantalmost got traded to the Pistons back in 2007 in exchange for Rip Hamilton and a couple other Detroit players. That rumor has been confirmed by Kobe himself, but the details surrounding it are still shrouded in mystery. Was Kobe the one who ultimately pulled the plug on the deal as he suggested during an interview with Yahoo! Sports in 2013—or did the Lakers decide that the trade wasn’t in the best interest of their franchise at the time?

CBS Sports just put together a story about one of the greatest NBA trades that never happened, and as part of it, they asked Hamilton—who now works for CBS Sports—to speak about what he knows about the trade. And he revealed that, when news about the potential deal first started popping up back in 2007, he went straight to Kobe to find out whether or not he should take it seriously.

Hamilton talks about the trade in the video above. We’ve also transcribed what he had to say and included it below so that you can read along and find out what Kobe told him when Hamilton went to talk to him about the trade during NBA All-Star Weekend in 2007. Here’s the story:

First of all, as an NBA player, you hear your name in trade rumors all the time. A lot of them are true, but the majority of them are false. It’s just a beat writer puts out something, and people believe it.

Can you imagine Kobe retiring as…a Piston? How weird would that have been?

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[via CBS Sports]

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