Years before Kobe Bryant welcomed Antawn Jamison to the Lakers in 2012 by posterizing him in practice, Jamison was a legit scorer on the Golden State Warriors, good for 20 & 10 almost every night. During Jamison's third season with the pre "We Believe" Warriors, he averaged a career-high 24 points. And on December 3rd of 2000, he scored a career-high 51 against the Seattle Sonics. He also grabbed 14 rebounds to go with his 23-of-36 shooting night but wasn't able to grab a victory.
The very next night, the Warriors welcomed Kobe Bryant and the Lakers to town and Jamison matched his career-high by scoring 51 again! Just as crazy as the fact that Jamison scored back-to-back 50 points was the fact that Kobe Bryant also scored a then career-high 51 in the game. Bryant did take six more shots and made three less, but that's not anything to be ashamed of since Jamison connected on an impressive 21-of-29 shots. The cherry on top for Jamison was the Warriors were able to pull off a 125-122 victory in OT against the future champs.
In between the time of that game and Jamison joining the Lakers, Bryant would have his share of a lot more 50 point games, including four consecutive ones (65-50-60-50) in 2007, while Jamison never reached the 50-point mark again. That's nothing to be ashamed of either because Jamison quietly kept doing his thing and crept into the top 50 scoring leaders of all-time. He currently sits at 44 -- ahead of John Stockton, Bernard King, Scottie Pippen, Isiah Thomas, Tracy McGrady, Earl Monroe, Chris Mullin, Glen Rice, Kevin McHale, Dwyane Wade, and many other NBA greats.
KOBE ON JAMISON / JAMISON ON KOBE
Two years ago, Jamison also had a pretty amusing story about Bryant and his mind frame in games.
"This guy's a different dude," Jamison said of Bryant on ESPNLA 710 radio. "Kobe will tell you, He's like, 'Look, you guys as my teammates, yell at me. Let me know that you're open because I'm so programmed,' and this guy has told me this, 'I see nothing but that basket. You could be open, there could be three guys on me, but the only thing I see is that basket so you have to tell me, Look, I was open. Or yell at me mid-play. That doesn't affect me at all and I respect that.' "
BONUS JAMISON