Kobe unafraid of hand-to-hand combat

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EL SEGUNDO — Can’t ever say Kobe Bryant won’t sacrifice his body for his game.

In fact, a lot of times he has tasted his blood from some sort of on-court scrape and redoubled his efforts because it stirs up something deep inside him. This situation with torn ligaments in the pinky finger of his shooting hand seems a little different because it is a real injury, not just a temporary problem. But Bryant still doesn’t see it as such a huge deal.

He said he’ll have to be wary of getting the finger caught on someone’s arm or jammed by the ball, and Phil Jackson said it’ll bother Bryant more on defense (when trying to use his hands to stay with a guy) than on offense. But the bottom line is that Bryant doesn’t expect to be much less efficient than normal, saying: “I’ve been playing with it hurt the past six games. … After that (struggle for the first two games after injuring it), doing treatment and taping it the right way, I felt fine.”

Asked about opponents deliberately hacking at the finger, Bryant said: “If these were the 1980s, I’d be worried about it. But I’m not worried about it now.”

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