It's confirmed: The Bulls missed out on Kobe Bryant _ twice.
The Lakers great demanded to be traded to Chicago in 2007, but in a sit-down with former teammate Shaquille O'Neal, Bryant admitted he was making moves to join the Bulls three years earlier.
Back in 2004, the Lakers had lost in embarrassing fashion to Pistons in the NBA Finals, and the Shaq-Kobe marriage was clearly frayed.
As Bryant told O'Neal during a "Players Only" segment for TNT for NBA All-Star weekend, "When I retire, I don't want people to see, he only won because of Shaq. As unfair as that is, Magic never won without Cap (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar). Michael (Jordan) never won without Scottie (Pippen). But here I am getting stuck with this argument, which is not fair, but yet this is the argument people will make. And I'm not OK with that."
Reports centered on Bryant, then a free agent, starting over with the Clippers, but he said he and wife were looking for homes and researching schools in the Chicago area. O'Neal had heard the rumors, but didn't believe it at the time.
"Oh yeah, we were looking for places in Chicago, man," Bryant said. "We were flying up there to meet with (Jerry) Reinsdorf and (John) Paxton."
O'Neal chimed in, "You would leave sunny California to go to cold-ass Chicago?"
"Vanessa signed off," Bryant said. "We were moving out to Lake Forest, I think it was. Chicago. And went on vacation in Italy, I got a phone call. (Then-agent) Rob Pelinka called and he said, 'Shaq just requested a trade.' I was like, 'Well there goes Chicago.' There's no way the Lakers are going to lose me and Shaq in the same year."
The Lakers traded O'Neal to the Heat and signed Bryant to a $136 million contract.
