Stephon Marbury has urged retiring Los Angeles Lakers great Kobe Bryant to join him playing in China at the end of his NBA career.

Marbury, a two-time NBA All-Star, was selected fourth overall in the 1996 NBA Draft – and he and Bryant are the last members of that star-studded class to play professionally.

Marbury has played in China since 2010, winning three Chinese Basketball Association titles in that time, while Bryant is retiring at the end of the 2015-16 campaign.

"They love him [Bryant] here. It is a little bit past love. It would be like the biggest thing ever in basketball here," Marbury told Yahoo Sports.

"It would be beyond huge. Beyond big. I would definitely encourage it.

"They love basketball here. You can't control the excitement."

Marbury dismissed criticism of the league, saying it was still competitive – albeit less so than the NBA.

"I try to tell people that it's not easy playing here because you are always on the court playing," he said. 

"You still got to put the ball in the hole. You still got to [succeed].

"Guys say, 'Oh, it's not competition.' It's not the competition in the NBA, but it's still competition."