Hatred, Respect, Admiration, and Heartbreak. Ty's Thoughts on Kobe

Yesterday while driving home from a very nice weekend visit to Cincinnati, at around 1:30pm, I started to get text messages from the group of guys I play basketball with asking if the Kobe Bryant news was true.

I had no idea what they were talking about because I was on a road trip, spending time with my wife and kids. I started to check some sports websites, to see what they may have been talking about, and no news had been released. All the sports sites only had stories about the Pro Bowl and the Super Bowl. I started to ask more questions on the text thread, because I was curious as to what they were talking about. I did not expect to read what I read next. Some of the guys showed some stories that were circulating around tabloid style sites saying that Bryant had been killed in a helicopter crash.

My first thought was that this was a hoax, one of those fake death things that comes out about the uber famous from time to time. I kind of said as much in the text chain. But, the more texts, and stories that were being sent made this feel more and more real with each passing minute. Pretty soon I got a notification from Bleacher Report on my watch, that Kobe Bryant had, indeed, been killed in a helicopter crash. In fact it said that as many as 9 people were involved in the crash, and that there were no survivors.

I was stunned. I didn't really know how to feel at first. I have never been silent on this site, to friends, on the pod, about my feelings towards Kobe Bryant. I was not a fan of his, not at all. I didn't like him as a player or a person. He seemed selfish on the court, and reportedly did heinous stuff off the court early in his career. But still, I had this unsettling, sad feeling deep in my gut. I was shocked by the news. I didn't really process it at first because I didn't think it was real. I mean, he was only 41 years old, and he always, always took his helicopter to places. This was one of the many things he was famous for doing. He used to helicopter into practice when he was still in the NBA.

As this news sat with me all day, I started thinking about how I would tackle the story for the blog today. I had one million different thoughts racing through my head. Like I said, I rooted against him, but maybe I did that because he was such a great foil and villain to the teams I liked. Make no mistake, Kobe Bryant was an all time great NBA player. He had the rare tenacity needed to be wildly successful as a pro. His work ethic was second only to Jordan. He spent infinite hours honing his craft, and it showed on the court. He put up ridiculous numbers, won MVP's and won titles. He is one of the greatest players ever. I rooted against MJ early in his career too, so maybe that was why I had so many conflicting feelings. Then the personal life stuff came up. Bryant was accused of a heinous crime, of which he was never convicted of. It is wildly believed that he did it, but the only people that will ever know are him and the woman in Colorado. This made me root against him even more when he was a player. But, as he got older, had some kids and settled everything with his wife, it felt as if he had redeemed himself. He seemed like he had tried to put that rotten past behind him. He became a great husband, and a doting and loving and caring father. I am a dad myself, and I follow a ton of dad centric websites, and Kobe Bryant always popped up as a person who was totally invested in his kids lives. He was there for all of them whenever he could be. He also became a champion for players standing up for their beliefs when the Colin Kaepernick stuff happened. He mentored young players trying to get in the league, or veterans trying to get better. He had a TV show where he dissected the games he watched, and dare I say, it was super informative. And he even showed great humility and graciousness when LeBron James surpassed him on the all time scoring list, just one day before his untimely death. Kobe Bryant seemed like a changed for the better man in his post basketball life. I look at all these young guys in the league now, how much they looked up to him, respected him and wanted to be him. That was me when I was younger, watching guys like Charles Barkley and Shawn Kemp. There is a whole new generation of players, currently in the league, who play because they watched Kobe play. I am stunned that I am saying this, but I had grown to respect who Bryant had become since his retirement. I looked at him differently more recently because he seemed like he had calmed, and was a champion for young guys, and the league. I recognized his importance to a sport that I have loved my whole life.

What made this horrific news even worse was when they started to identify the rest of the passengers, and one of them was his 13 year old daughter Gigi. In fact, they were going to one of her practices in the helicopter when this all happened. I, again as a father of 2 myself, was completely heartbroken when this news scrolled across my screen when I got home. As I said before, Bryant was a doting father, and he was taking one of his daughters to her practice, of which he ran, in the helicopter. I simply cannot imagine the terror that they both had when they realized what was happening. I cannot fathom what his widow, who has been with him since they were both 17, and his other remaining children are going through as I write this. This is the type of thing that I wouldn't wish upon my worst enemy. Not only was a legendary basketball player lost yesterday, but more importantly, and more devastating, a father and husband and a daughter and sister were lost yesterday.

This is a tragedy unlike anything I have seen involving people I have no personal connection to. For my generation, this is like when John Lennon died. I wonder if this is how RD felt when Prince died, except he was a huge fan of his. This is worse than when Magic confirmed that he was HIV positive. Kobe Bryant was a worldwide super star. Everyone knows who he was. I received texts from many other people, people I hadn't heard from in ages, asking me if I had heard this news yesterday. This is something that is going to linger, and stay with people forever. We all saw LeBron's reaction. We watched Dwayne Wade's moving video. We saw Carmelo tear up in a post game press conference. We saw all the tributes, the 24 second and 8 second violations that happened yesterday. We saw Trae Young come out wearing number 8. We all witnessed this, and we will remember this forever.

This is a truly devastating event that occurred. I feel for everyone involved in this wreck, and I simply do not know how the families of the victims carry on. Just know, you are in mine, and everybody else's thoughts. This is devastating. I hope everyone finds peace. Rest in Peace Kobe Bryant and Gigi Bryant. You were taken far, far too early. You will be tremendously missed by so, so many people. This stinks.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast.

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