LeBron may have been responsible for the release of Kendrick Lamar's Untitled Tracks but Kobe Bryant gets a special remix of one of those untitled tracks (#7 aka Levitate) with some poetic words from the great Scoop Jackson in an ESPN tribute video called "Kobe Bryant: Fade to Black."

There's not much I can say about Kendrick Lamar aka easily the best rapper ever not from the golden age of hip-hop that hasn't and isn't being said on a daily basis but I can and will say a few words about one of the most influential hoop journalists ever, who was shining during the golden age of hip-hop: Robert "Scoop" Jackson.

SCOOP: GAME POINT

Scoop, along with the original Slam Magazine crew that gave us articles on LJ and Kemp SI wouldn't and couldn't, made basketball articles fun in the 90s the way the tv show 'Inside Stuff' made basketball highlights fun, but Scoop was more Fab 5 Freddy than Ahmad Rashad. Many of his articles in Slam from the mid to late 90s are still as quotable to me as songs I heard back then from rappers who deserve more props, like O.C, Large Professor and Mic Geronimo. I even bum rushed him at all-star weekend with a Webber article from 1998 that left him as speechless as I was talkative after pulling the issue out of my mailbox - along with my 10 free CDs (I miss those deals) and my 4 pages of weekly stats from the Fantasy basketball league I was in (yes, stats were mailed to you and you had to call and talk to a live person to make roster changes).  Those were the days. Black Moon on my walkman, Young Penny and Shaq in EP mode on my VHS tapes and Scoop in my favorite magazine.