If you haven’t listened to it already, I cannot recommend enough the recent Lowe Post podcast where Grantland’s Zach Lowe had Bleacher Report’s Howard Beck as a guest. The entire podcast focused on Beck’s time as a Lakers’ beat reporter when he worked for the LA Daily News from 1997 through 2004. Beck left the LADN for the NY Times in the summer of ’04, of course, but he recalls his time covering the Lakers fondly and brings great perspective as well as some untold stories that are, for Lakers’ fans especially, essential listening.
I use that podcast as an intro here because one of the many topics covered during their hour-long discussion was Kobe’s reputation as a “gunner”.