Highlights from a long SI article on Love & Mayo after the jump…

Sonny Vaccaro on Love/Mayo taking over the LA basketball scene:

“Now that Kobe doesn’t know what he’s doing, they’re going to own the city,” says the recently retired grassroots hoops guru and founder of the ABCD camps. “You’re going to start seeing the Denzels and the Jacks at college games. I can sense it already: [UCLA-USC] will be a major ticket.”

Kobe Bryant’s advice to Mayo:

Mayo says he has enough confidence to keep firing, a lesson his idol, Kobe Bryant, reinforced last summer during the final moments of a deadlocked pickup game in L.A. Mayo had made three straight shots, but he passed up the deciding jumper, feeding an open shooter instead. Mayo’s teammate missed; Bryant’s team won. Afterward, Bryant pulled Mayo aside and offered some advice: “When you’ve got it going like that, take the shot!”

The media’s portrayal of Mayo:

Now that reporters can spend more time with Mayo, Floyd hopes the public will stop hearing the term punk alongside his name and finally see the inquisitive student who scored a 29 on his ACT, who became the first recruit in Floyd’s three-year tenure to test out of freshman English, who’s taking a weekly three-hour journalism seminar, and who talks about going into real estate and opening restaurants […]

A Fight Between Friends [SI]