The Los Angeles Lakers are continuing a sacred memorial today in the honoring of basketball legends Kobe and Gigi Bryant. As revealed in a story by ESPN’s Dave McMenamin, Thursday marked the second day that the statue (one of a three-piece set) was set to be revealed which was held in a private ceremony intended for close friends and family.
“A statue depicting Kobe Bryant and daughter Gianna “Gigi” Bryant will be unveiled in a private tented ceremony Friday outside of Crypto.com Arena,” wrote ESPN’s Dave McMenamin. “The statue is the second of three planned monuments to the Lakers legend, who died in a tragic helicopter crash along with Gigi and seven others in January 2020.”
“The statue of the father and daughter is located near the Los Angeles Kings’ monument celebrating the team’s 50th anniversary. It will be available for the public to visit starting Saturday morning, sources told ESPN.”
Kobe and his family are icons in the Lakers community and the whole world banded around the organization when the tragic helicopter crash took the lives of Kobe and Gianna.
Naturally, the Lakers expressed their grief and support in various ways and these statue unveilings are just one of their latest attempts to immortalize his legacy. It features Iobe and Gigi with Bryant sporting his iconic “No. 24” Lakers jersey.
Unfortunately, the first one didn’t turn out so well after the fans went viral for their negative reaction to the statue. Besides misspellings, many fans claimed that it looked cheap and that it was unworthy to represent Kobe’s iconic career.
In this case, nobody knows what the statue will look like but one can imagine that it will contain a figure in the share of an iconic pose with Kobe and Gigi. Before they died, they spent many hours together both privately and in public discussing the game and life itself.
While Kobe is hardly the first NBA player to get his own statue, it may have come earlier than most expected. Bryant, an 18x All-Star, played for 20 years in the NBA and retired as one of the All-Time greats for his five NBA championships.
He was only 41 when he passed away and his daughter, Gianna, was only 13. To say it’s a moment that stuck with the Lakers would be an understatement and they’re still trying to commemorate his legacy to this day.
With LeBron James and Anthony Davis, the Lakers have had some success and they do have a title to show for it. But now, with LeBron entering his 22nd season, they are in a difficult position to find their next franchise leader.
Whoever they bring in is unlikely to be as popular as Kobe. No. 24 has surpassed NBA lore and he captivated an entire city to admire his ideals/approach to life itself. He’s got three statues raised in his honor that thousands will see every day as a tribute to his life.
