I was headed to lunch with a friend of mine when he recieved a call from his father (whose name is Buddy) asking him to join him for lunch. We were headed to our usual Thursday lunch spot to meet several friends, but Buddy wanted to meet at another restaurant. Buddy turned down our offer to drive by and pick him up and take him to the restaurant we were going to. Which was strange, because he has eaten with us before and seems to get along with all of us. Something was up.

Buddy had been cutting grass at a church across the street from the restaurant that he wanted to meet us at. My friend, who knows his Dad very well, decided we should drive by the restaurant and see if his Dad was there. I thought my friend wanted to try and convince his Dad to come join us for lunch, but my friend had something else in mind. When we drove by the restaurant, we saw Buddy's lawn mower parked in a parking space at the restaurant.

Yes, that's right. He drove the lawn mower to the restaurant, rather than driving his own vehicle. He parked it in a parking space (up front) and went inside and ate lunch. And yes, we live in Alabama.

So what does this have to do with Kobe?

All year long, we've heard about how Kobe is a changed man. He's become unselfish. He's the ultimate teammate And then Curt Schilling talks about him in his blog and suddenly Kobe is a villian again, except in LA where they are blinded with Kobe love.

Here's the thing. Kobe has never changed. And he's not the jerk he's made out to be. (Unless the rape alllegations are true, then he's much worse than we think.) Kobe's just a competitor. And when a competitor gets on the court, he wants to win.

Mychael Thompson, former Laker and current Laker analyst, made an interesting comparison between Kobe and Magic in his interview with Dan Patrick on Monday. In Schilling's blog, he claimed Kobe wouldn't even acknowledge his teammates during time outs. Thompson said Magic did that too. He would even call you out for not making a play. The only difference between Kobe and Magic is that Magic did it with a smile on his face. So the fans loved him and it was hard for someone to criticize him.

MJ and Bird were notorius for being tough on their teammates as well. MJ even punched Steve Kerr in practice one time. They were the ultimate competitors and they wanted to win.

So, again, what do Buddy and Kobe have in common? Buddy has lived in a small town in Alabama his whole life. The kind of place where you could drive your lawn mower to the restaurant and not only would everyone act like nothing was wrong, they would probably come out and admire your lawn mower.

Buddy has retired and moved to the "big" city now. I guess he's supposed to be a little more "civilized" now. Just like Kobe. Suddenly, Kobe is the ultimate unselfish teammate. He supposed to trust them completely. But Buddy will always be Buddy. And Kobe will always be Kobe. No matter what town Buddy's in, he'll always feel comfortable enough to use a lawn mower as a source of transportation.

And Kobe, he'll always be a competitor. He may say in interviews that he trusts his teammates more, but he trusts them because they have been winning. All he knows and cares about is winning. So he's going to revert to some of his old practices, even if it makes him look bad.

And by the way, if I recall correctly, Schilling didn't seem to chummy with his teammates during the bloody sock game. And didn't John Kruk used to say that all of the Phillies hated him? I'm just asking......