Kobe Bryant Comments on Michael Jordan, Retirement and More

Following Kobe Bryant's announcement of his retirement from professional basketball effective at the end of the 2015-16 season on the Players' Tribune, the Los Angeles Lakers legend discussed his decision and much more Wednesday.

ABCNews.com provided a clip of his interview with Robin Roberts of Good Morning America, which shed some light on his departure from the game of basketball:



The 37-year-old future Hall of Famer made mention of "knowing" it was time to step away, and described an epiphany he had during his morning meditation sessions:

You know, going through my entire career, I've never really understood what athletes meant when they said, 'You—when you know you know.' But now I certainly understand it ... So once I knew this was it, might as well say it.

[...] 

I try to have at least 15 minutes of still time and just kind of sit in my thoughts in the morning and just kind of meditate. And normally what happens with me is my mind would always drift to the game. Always. And then I found myself sitting there. My mind wouldn't drift towards the game all the time anymore. And that's when I started realizing, 'You know what? It's getting close. It's getting close.' Because now I'm not obsessively thinking about the game anymore. It's not wired into my subconscious the way it used to be.

The 17-time All Star also admitted that injuries piling up over the past few seasons played a role in his choice to hang up the sneakers after 20 NBA seasons:

It was something that kind of evolved over the last three years, you know, with the Achilles injury, that really frightened me. Because you know, it was like, 'My career could be over now.' It scared me. 'What am I going do next?' sort of thing. So I took that time to start trying to figure that out.

[...] 

And it was just like, 'Oh my,' this is one thing after the next, you ...

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