After his appearance on a talk show where he strongly stated that he wants to have a voice in the Lakers' coaching choice, GM Mitch Kupchak tries to put him back in his place.

In an interview with Jimmy Kimmel, Kobe was a little irked, and his tone seemed to blame their front office for the failure of the coaches. But Kupchak rightfully stands his ground.

Kupchak was in Chicago for the annual draft combine. He talked to ESPN: "From time to time we ask his advice. He really won't weigh in on something like this. I'm not even sure that we'll talk to him prior to interviews. But from time to time, he is in our facility, I'll go downstairs and I'll talk to him about a bunch of different things."

On the Lakers roster:  "We need some players. We don't have many players under contract right now. Fortunately, we did sign a good player back in November: Kobe Bryant. So, we have him to rely on. He's been working out every day at our facility. He looks good. And we have a bunch of free agents and some of the players on our roster last year, some of the younger players, played well. So we're looking forward to maybe bringing some of those guys back and looking at the free-agent market and then once again, our lottery pick."

On why they did not compete to take the top coaching names: "I think a coach's success, in a great part, depends on the players. You do have to get good players to win in this league. So, whether it's an experienced coach or inexperienced coach, I'm not quite sure what direction we'll go right now. I know our fans in Los Angeles are impatient, so it's not like we're on a seven- or eight-year rebuild schedule. We're going to try to win as soon as possible. It may take more than a year, but we're not going to try to drag it out."

Kobe Bryant is a player. He is paid to play his guts out on the court. And he has done that since 1996. While he is the face of the franchise, he has to accept the fact that he is still just an employee. He might be the highest paid, but he is not paid to make decisions.

Despite the grandstanding done by players, they ultimately know that the league will go on without them. Even the Black Mamba. So the best thing to do is play for your team, whoever is coaching-win or lose, you get your 48 million as you ride into the sunset.