VIDEO: Kobe Bryant Shows Appreciation for Spurs and Credits Them for Stopping Lakers' Dominance

Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson were joined by Kobe Bryant on their podcast "All The Smoke" recently, and the Los Angeles Lakers' legend had some nice things to say about the San Antonio Spurs. Bryant credits the Spurs with putting a halt to the Lakers' potential unmitigated dominance at the time.

The five-time NBA Champion was asked how many titles the Lakers could've won if him and Shaq had a better relationship with one other. Bryant immediately began to praise the Spurs and downplayed the belief that he and Shaq weren't "on the same page" during some of their postseason runs.

The Spurs eliminated the Lakers from the 2002-2003 postseason in the Western Conference Semifinals, and San Antonio won the Finals that year. Gregg Popovich's squad also capture titles in 2004-2005 and 2006-2007 but didn't run into LA during the postseason those years.

Bryant went on to win back-to-back titles from in '08-'09 and '09-'10 on his own, and captured the Finals MVP both years, so he definitely ended up rebounding after the Spurs halted LA for a bit earlier in the decade.