In news that would absolutely shock just about everyone, Kobe Bryant is reportedly considering coming out of retirement from the game of basketball to play in Ice Cube’s BIG 3 league.

Brandon Robinson of Bball Society had the news:

Kobe Bryant will play in @thebig3 next season according to Big 3 co-founder Jeff Kwatinetz while speaking on the league's weekly conference call. #KobeBryant #big3playoffs pic.twitter.com/uJsswdAFiD — Brandon Robinson (@ScoopB) August 21, 2018

Honestly, this is one of the most shocking developments of the offseason. By all accounts, Bryant seemed perfectly at peace with what he’s done on the basketball court and, frankly, the BIG 3 League just kind of seems below him.

Now, we don’t know to what extent Kobe will be participating in the league. For example, Allen Iverson committed to playing in the league’s first season and was considered by all accounts to be the biggest name to be attached to the league. He barely showed up and hasn’t played since.

Bryant is one of the most competitive people ever to play basketball, so it’s hard to envision him committing to this with any other intention than to murder literally anyone who challenges him on the court win as many games while scoring as many points as possible and continue doing that until it’s 100 percent clear he doesn’t belong on the court with those participating in the league.

I’d advise as much skepticism as possible on this front. It just doesn’t make any sense. Ben Rohrback of Yahoo! Sports has a report that more closely falls along those lines.

On the Kobe Bryant to BIG3 front, I’m told by the league’s PR firm: co-owner "Jeff Kwatinetz didn’t say it was happening, but noted he heard it from a credible source." — Ben Rohrbach (@brohrbach) August 21, 2018

And a little more context:

Here’s the full exchange.



Kwatinetz: “I did hear from a credible source that Kobe is going to be playing next year. That’s something, but it may be nothing.”



Not exactly a full-on commitment. pic.twitter.com/zaHBetdJmy — Ben Rohrbach (@brohrbach) August 21, 2018

We’ll see if this actually comes to fruition. A ton can change between now and whenever the BIG 3 kicks off its next season. But if this does happen, I would imagine most fans will be torn on how to feel about seeing Kobe play again.

On one hand, it’ll be cool to see one of the best ever to play get out there and mess around for a bit. On the other, most of his last season was painful to watch. I’m not sure if I’m ready for anything more resembling that. We’ll see, I guess.