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My friend Max (who also goes by Jamal, or Dealmaker ... I have have been consulting with about reducing his names, and as a joke I said "Max/Jamal/Dealmaker, you're like the Triple Threat!" His response: "That's a great name! Call me Triple Threat!" My response: "I'm not sure you're getting the message.") has long been a great admirer of Kobe Bryant.

Sometimes he gets frustrated with me for suggesting that LeBron James might be better than Bryant.

But in the last few months, Max's feelings have gotten a lot more complicated. He's noticing more and more things about James, including this amazing point: "LeBron's mouthpiece is great for his appeal. His initial impulses to complain about something literally have a hard time even coming out of his mouth. It buys him a second or two to consider. Subtle glares are marketable signs of intensity and a will to win; F bombs are not."

Max recently e-mailed the following thoughts about Bryant:

Kobe's competitive drive pushes him to establish incredible standards of personal excellence that he has not to date translated to his teammates -- except during Team USA.

As Bill Simmons recently wrote, that appears to be coming back to bite him as he's raised the level of play for his rival, and key competitors (LeBron, Carmelo, Wade).

Now that everyone is hanging off of King James' shorts, Kobe appears to be reverting to an old paradigm of personal skill instead of using his current competitive advantage (mental composure, skills, and will) to inspire his teammates.

10,000 games, 12 years and two squeaky knees later Bryant still appears to be creating difficult situations for himself, so that he can emerge the hero or the villain.

Max also has some strong thoughts about how Kobe Bryant appears in the media.

Kobe's consciousness of his own public image prevents him from being a public authority on anything. His positions are too calculated. I believe that is quietly driving people to LeBron James as the answer. We can see James trying to figure it out in front of us, even when it's corny, it's authentically corny.

Bryant is like a PR machine, furiosly restoring his pre-Colorado reputation. Now he's just confused.

He gets tripped by Dahntay Jones: "It's good basketball."

He is gassed and his team loses by 19 in Denver? "We got our butts kicked."

Camera on him to get a day in the life? "Phil and I sometimes call the same plays at the same time."

C'mon dude, grow up!

His best physical days are behind him, so why not use his mental advantage to help his team? When is that "I believe in Laker tradition" stuff gonna turn into "Hey Pau, make your post moves faster, they can't guard you one-on-one but they are playing faster as a team so you need to make faster moves?"

When was the last time you saw him grab Andrew Bynum by the back of the head and whisper some words of encouragement, the way LeBron does to his teammates all the time? If Bynum was as inspired as Anderson Varejao, the Lakers would already be in the Finals.

But the truth is, Bryant isn't that guy, and increasingly I am less inspired to watch.

Kobe's got the focus of a ninja and the heart of an assassin. I hope he turns those attributes on for the Lakers' benefit, before the team turns on him.