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Watch When Kobe Bryant Dominated the Summer League 20 Years Ago

Watch and enjoy some vintage Kobe from the 1996 Summer League.

Here's some pretty rare footage that's been floating around of Kobe Bryant putting on a show during NBA Summer League action in 1996. It looks like portions of this clip reel come from a July 13 game at the Pyramid Long Beach Arena against China, when Kobe was still about a month shy of 18 years old. The clips are all from the same summer, so even if it bled past his birthday, he was still a young, young buck out there doing work.

Kobe's first shot on the highlight reel foreshadows the next 20 years of his career: a deep two-pointer, just inside the three-point line. The rest is similarly Vintage Kobe, slashing to the rim, contorting himself like MJ, and scoring at will. Even though much of the footage is absolute trash—how did anyone watch television before HD?—you can tell it's Kobe just by the way he moves around and carries himself.

Watch through the end and you will also see a young Derek Fisher dunk over two players at the 8:51 mark.

[RealGM]