These young guys are playing checkers. I'm out there playing chess.

I'm chasing perfection.

My parents are my backbone. Still are. They're the only group that will support you if you score zero or you score 40.

There's been a lot of talk of me being a one-man show but that's simply not the case. We win games when I score 40 points and we've won when I score 10.

I'll do whatever it takes to win games, whether it's sitting on a bench waving a towel, handing a cup of water to a teammate, or hitting the game-winning shot.

Everyting negative - pressure, challenges - is all an opportunity for me to rise.

I dont want to be the next Michael Jordan, I only want to be Kobe Bryant.

These young guys are playing checkers. I'm out there playing chess.

Can I jump over two or three guys like I used to? No. Am I as fast as I used to be? No, but I still have the fundamentals and smarts. That's what enables me to still be a dominant player. As a kid growing up, I never skipped steps. I always worked on fundamentals because I know athleticism is fleeting.

Christmas morning, I'm going to open presents with my kids. I'm going to take pictures of them opening the presents. Then I'm going to come to the Staples Center and get ready to work.

Eeew, I'd be a little uncomfortable Googling myself. People sit there - and Google themselves? That's kind of weird.

Everyone looks at your watch and it represents who you are, your values and your personal style.

I can't relate to lazy people. We don't speak the same language. I don't understand you. I don't want to understand you.

I don't talk trash often, but when I do, I go for the jugular.

I don't think a coach becomes the right coach until he wins a championship.

I like playing for the purple and gold. This is where I want to finish up.

I'm extremely willful to win, and I respond to challenges. Scoring titles and stuff like that... it sounds, well, I don't care how it sounds - to me, scoring comes easy. It's not a challenge to me to win the scoring title, because I know I can.

I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. No matter what the injury - unless it's completely debilitating - I'm going to be the same player I've always been. I'll figure it out. I'll make some tweaks, some changes, but I'm still coming.

I'm more than comfortable just sitting back and scoring 21, 22 points or whatever and getting 10, 11 assists whatever the case might be. More than comfortable with that. It's just a matter of the pieces that you have around you and what you can do to elevate everybody else.

If there were camera phones back in the day, the biggest athletes in the world would have had a lot of explaining to do.

In an individual sport, yes, you have to win titles. Baseball's different. But basketball, hockey? One person can control the tempo of a game, can completely alter the momentum of a series. There's a lot of great individual talent.

It never bothered me when people would say, 'You only win championships because you're playing with Shaq.' It bothered me when he said it.

It's disgusting, but my father taught me when your mouth gets dry, just suck the sweat out of your own jersey. There's no bravado to any of it; it's just a disgusting little trick.

People just don't understand how obsessed I am with winning.

Sports are such a great teacher. I think of everything they've taught me: camaraderie, humility, how to resolve differences.

The important thing is that your teammates have to know you're pulling for them and you really want them to be successful.

The only thing I'm afraid of is bees. I don't like bees. I'm allergic to them.

The people who truly know me know what I'm like. There have been people who try to say things that aren't fair, and I check them. And then they don't like me because I checked them.

What people see on court is another side of me; it's not me.

Winning takes precedence over all. There's no gray area. No almosts.

You want me to own a team and deal with these rich, spoiled stubborn athletes, and try to get them to perform? No thank you.

Winning takes precedence over all. There’s no gray area. No almosts.

Everything negative (pressure, challenges) is all an opportunity for me to rise.

The most important thing is to try and inspire people so that they can be great in whatever they want to do.

My parents are my backbone. Still are. They’re the only group that will support you if you score zero or you score 40.

I dont think a coach becomes the right coach until he wins a championship.

You always have to be on edge. You always have to take every practice every game like it is your last.

Friends come and go but banners hang forever.

Heroes come and go, but legends are forever.

Once you open your eyes and start looking around you, you start picking up things that are very obvious.

Theses officers were good friends, so it must have been a terrible argument, because the one who played chess with my father was so angry that he walked over to the dentist's house and got the dentist out of bed and shot him.

Nowadays there is more dynamism in chess, modern players like to take the initiative. Usually they are poor defenders though.

Life's too short for chess.

I believe every chess player senses beauty, when he succeeds in creating situations, which contradict the expectations and the rules, and he succeeds in mastering this situation.

Chess is intellectual gymnastics.

I play chess badly and I've been beaten by my 10-year old son.

I'm like Bush, I see the world more like checkers than chess.

Far be it from me to force anyone into either chess or dressage, but if you choose to do so yourself, in my opinion there is only one way: follow the rules.

I also follow chess on the Internet, where Kasparov's site is very interesting.