NBA One year after its tragic demise, the basketball myth is a global icon
El April 13, 2016, Kobe Bryant played his last game in the NBA. Had 37 to, he retired and put 60 points, a god in the twilight. On January 26, 2020, he died with his daughter Gianna in a tragic helicopter accident. It had been almost four years since that emotional game of Staples Center ending a 20-year career with the Lakers. What had he done in that period of time? Achieved excellence in bsket, eager to transcend beyond the baskets with feverish activity, but discreet. The most notable thing was in 2018 winning an Oscar for a documentary, ‘Dear Basketball’. He had served as an ambassador for FIBA at the 2019 World Cup in China and took advantage of his retirement to give himself to the family that he had formed with Vanessa, his longtime partner, after two exhausting decades, with all his energy channeled into a sick obsession: emulate Jordan and be the best.
Kobe had to die to claim that he was still in top shape, who was playing games in which he scored 81 points. It is now 15 years since the only game of his life that his grandmother saw, that feat. Suddenly, a huge work emerged far from the fields. He left to be more present than ever, whether in multiple tributes (that I did not receive in life), as a reference for athletes, activist in favor of women’s sport or leading various activities that speak of a multi-talented character with an entrepreneurial mindset and determination to help manufacture success with the painstaking effort with which he developed his career: watched everything, to the menu of his companions, the hours of sleep, the game itself, the statistics, the rivals, the weather, the traffic, the journalists, the streaks, the records within reach.
A year after their goodbye that foggy morning in LA., Kobe is alive, as is Elvis. It shows. He inspired the Lakers on their way to the 17th franchise title, the first without Bryant in the 21st century, and also Jason Arasheben, Tony Jason of Beberly Hills, the jeweler who has designed the championship rings for the players and coaches of the Lakers, valued at $ 20,000. Two entwined snakes recall the figure of The Black Mamba.
Counted Pau Gasol, who was speechless for a few hours after the impact of the news of the death of his close friend and who still does not give credit to what happened (“because if anyone could survive that accident it was him, he was invincible”, has said in ESPN), that Kobe was developing an investment fund to help young people entering the NBA. It was only a small part of a gigantic purpose. The fund had been created in 2013 to support data technology and analytics companies. It was all the result of his relationship with the businessman Jeff Stibel. It was a company endowed at its start of almost 90 million euros in which Kobe identified entrepreneurs with great capacity for work and helped them to succeed. When he came to the NBA as a 17-year-old from high school, he was just that, a daring teenager obsessed with improving himself to reign. In ‘The Wall Street Journal’ he summarized the work of his last months. “The most important thing I do now is help others to be successful.”
Kobe’s figure is behind a twenty companies related to technology, with sports websites such as ‘The Players Tribune’, the video game firm ‘Scopely’ and a telemarketing software company called RingDNA, among others. He was a man with enormous curiosity, with many projects that, however, did not receive as much focus as his baskets. Signature Bryant-Stibel, with three strategic lines, now has nearly $ 2 billion in assets in 2021. The big deal came with BodyArmor, a beverage startup that ended up buying Coca Cola. He invested 6 million dollars and sold it for 200. He also has interests in Dell, Alibaba or EpicGames, the company that created Fortnite.
No more beautiful project these days than the one he developed with actress Olivia Munn. It’s about the Granity Studies, founded by the athlete to produce films, television series and books and novels related to sports. “Stories are the best way to inspire.” Granity is a multimedia company where Munn says that Kobe “created everything from tree leaves to continents to oceans.” He did it following the story of some friends of the actress, who had told their eldest son how his four-year-old sister had died and was now one of the stars in the sky. The story moved Kobe so much that together they develop stories to help children accept death without so much fear.
The accolade of 2018 for this project was ‘Dear Basketball’, the first Oscar for a professional athlete. Kobe also wanted to succeed as a storyteller. ‘The Wizenard Series’ is a series of novels for teenagers that started with ‘Training Camp’. Edited in Spain by Roca, it is written by the multi-award winning Wesley King. It tells of the adventures of the youth team, the West Bottom Badgers. Before he died, Kobe also developed another book called ‘Legacy and the Queen’ with tennis player Naomi Osaka, about a young 12-year-old tennis player, and was involved in the production of a movie, ‘Muse’. The last book is being corrected by Vanessa who knew perfectly the spirit of her husband. “Stories to help our daughters”.
Outstanding businessman, creator of multimedia content, idol of thousands of fans and NBA stars such as LeBron or Anthony Davis, who have his image tattooed, Kobe will never leave. In May enter the Basketball Hall of Fame. Trump decided to be one of the 250 statues of the ‘Garden of Heroes’ along with other myths such as Ali or Babe Ruth. His figure encompasses everything. During Bubble games, Tim Harris, Lakers president of operations, spoke “of the magic of thinking that he is watching us.” They were statements after Davis hit a triple on the horn to win a game. I yelled “Kobe, Kobe” in celebration. This season, Lakers players break the pregame ring with the shout of “Kobe, three.”
Bryant was in those playoffs because the Lakers wore a black jersey, fruit of the NBA-Nike relationship. But Bryant, restless, had planned by 2020 to break the link with the Oregon multinational and found his own brand, Mamba. I no longer thought like a player. In one of his last interviews, he said how he wanted to be remembered. “A person capable of creating stories that will inspire children to dream. But not just dreaming for the sake of dreaming, but transmitting the initiative to wake up every morning and do everything possible to help make that dream come true. If they remembered me like that, it would be great”. Kobe is already part of everyone’s memory. “His spirit will always be there,” Magic Johnson summarized yesterday. Kobe lives.
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