Tony Allen says he and Kobe Bryant ‘never’ talked until Lakers icon offered him message right before retiring

Former NBA defensive specialist Tony Allen and former Los Angeles Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant did battle on the league’s grandest stage on two separate occasions. Allen’s Boston Celtics and Bryant’s Lakers met in the 2008 NBA Finals and 2010 NBA Finals and split the two championship series.

In 2008, the Celtics got the job done and sent Bryant and the storied Lakers franchise packing in six games. But Bryant’s Lakers got their revenge in 2010, as they beat the Celtics in seven games.

Despite the fact that Allen and Bryant faced off against one another in so many games (in both the regular season and playoffs), Allen said that the Lakers legend “never” actually talked to him until soon before he retired from the NBA. Bryant last played in the league in the 2015-16 season, when he appeared in 66 of Los Angeles’ 82 games.

“Me and Kobe, man, we never talked, bro,” Allen said. “We never had one conversation on the court. I ain’t never said — only thing he ever said to me was the last time he played. He grabbed me, hugged me. He was like, ‘Bro, I enjoyed all the battles, bro. You the toughest.’ He like, ‘You the toughest.’

“He told me in my ear, and I’m like, ‘Damn.’ I just couldn’t believe — I’m like, ‘This man actually said something to me.’ I’m talking about my whole 14 years of playing basketball, that was the only conversation I had with him.”

Before Bryant tragically passed away, he boldly claimed that Allen was the toughest defender he ever went up against.

In 2016, perhaps after the game that Allen referenced in his story, Bryant gifted him a pair of shoes.

Allen was easily one of the premier perimeter defenders of his generation, and his resume backs that up. He earned All-Defensive honors six times over the course of his pro career. Furthermore, he ended up in the running for several iterations of the Defensive Player of the Year award, as he finished in the top six in voting for the prestigious award thrice.

It’s worth noting that Allen’s defensive accolades started to pile up after he left the Celtics and joined the Memphis Grizzlies.

He was still an elite defensive player even after Bryant decided to call it quits on his NBA career to boot. In the season after Bryant retired, the 2016-17 campaign, Allen earned a spot on the All-Defensive Second Team after he played in 71 contests for the Grizzlies.

Allen is one of a select group of players who can brag that he beat Bryant in an NBA Finals series, as Bryant lost just two of the seven championship series he played in throughout his career. Before he lost to the Celtics in 2008, he lost to the Detroit Pistons in a gentleman’s sweep in the 2004 NBA Finals.