Can Anthony learn from Kobe's journey?

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From where Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant was to where he is now must be an object lesson to the Denver Nuggets' Carmelo Anthony. None of Anthony's mishaps with the law or with society, nor any of teammate Allen Iverson's come to that, can compare to Bryant, now the Most Valuable Player in basketball.From accused rapist and selfish pinhead to model citizen and all-around team inspiration, that is Bryant. And that could be Anthony, needing only to step over hurdles that Bryant needed to leap.To be in the Age of Kobe, as this is and shall remain for another five years or so, as it once was with Michael Jordan, the rest of basketball will simply have to pay respect to the man and wait its turn.Anthony has time, as does LeBron James, who is odds-on to get to Kobeland before Anthony does. And the other current emerging figures of the game -- Chris Paul, Dwight Howard, along with the inevitable James -- will parallel Anthony in his chase to glory.Such things seem important to Anthony, recognition and individual prizes, as they once did to Bryant, as they did at the expense of his own team, as they do now with Anthony for the same reason.Until Bryant decided to be the leader instead of the focus (and who does not believe he can score 81 points anytime he wants to?) he would remain feared but never admired, marveled at but never revered.Anthony produces that same grudging regard, so clearly talented, and yet always lessened by some sort of failure or petulance or whine.But how obvious is the formula and how similar the ingredients, with Bryant and Anthony both teenage prizes, suffering early letdowns, the talent obvious, too many public missteps, though, by the same time, Bryant had two titles to Anthony's none.Bryant even had to share with a more established and grander figure, Shaquille O'Neal being Anthony's own Iverson, and it was not until they split that the reassembly of Bryant could begin.That is how it will happen also with Anthony, who has been less obvious than was Bryant in his frustrations of being one of a pair instead of one alone.There is even a Colorado connection, Anthony playing here, of course, and Bryant flitting in and out to answer charges of sexual assault. One wonders if the two did not pass in stretch limos, one going to the airport, the other leaving it.Public disgust for Bryant was much greater than it ever has been for Anthony. Melo's assorted blunders bring a shake of the head, while Bryant's might more have caused a shake of the fist.Bryant diligently and publicly endured, not regaining what he had before, a wholesome image compared to some of the more delinquent types the NBA seemed to attract, but gradually emerging on the other side of shame and scandal.When Steve Nash or Dirk Nowitzki were winning the MVP award, Bryant was still the best player in basketball, and it was not just a sop to Canada or Europe that Bryant was ignored (along with Tim Duncan and Kevin Garnett and any number of other players who were, and still are, better than those two at that time), but the message was inescapable: Make your team better and rewards will come.This still does not entirely explain Nowitzki, but Anthony should take the point as Bryant has. Team first, ego second.Of course, the Nuggets will have to win and Anthony will have to be the reason.Except for Nowitzki last season and Iverson in 2001 and possibly Charles Barkley in '93, the long list of MVPs all have in common the single trait of making players around them better. And now it is Bryant who has clearly taken the Lakers beyond where they would have been had he still been his old self.Even Bryant's temper fit last summer, of threatening to leave the Lakers, of demanding better help, was a kind of leadership that differed from his ultimatum that it was either he or Shaq.Anthony's similar moment, when he accused his teammates of quitting, might have been misdirected, but it is not without merit. It was an awkward attempt at leadership, part frustration and part vanity, but in there is the call for something better.Even as he accepts the award, Bryant emphasizes team, probably believing most of it.Another bit of conduct for Anthony to emulate.(Contact Bernie Lincicome of the Rocky Mountain News at lincicomeb(at)rockymountainnews.com.)