Bittersweet Video Of Kobe Saying Gigi Was The Heir To His Basketball Legacy Resurfaces After Crash
13-year-old Gianna Bryant was her father’s daughter in every way.
Gigi, as she is affectionately known, and her father -- global sports superstar Kobe -- were tragically killed along with seven other people on Sunday (January 26) in a helicopter crash in Calabasas, California.
The helicopter was traveling to Thousand Oaks, California, on a very foggy morning to the Mamba Sports Academy for a basketball tournament.
The Mamba Sports Academy is Kobe’s state-of-the-art facility designed to challenge the way men, women and youth approach human performance.
Taking its name from Kobe’s nickname “the Black Mamba,” the goal is to instill inside all participants Kobe’s “Mamba Mentality,” constantly working to be the best version of one’s self.
Gigi took after her father in that way.
In a story for the New Yorker in 2014, Kobe remembers a time playing a board game with a then 3-year-old Gigi.
“You know, it’s my move,” he said. “She obviously can see that I can win, so she’ll know that I’m not-winning on purpose. Then what’s that teaching? So I just play the game, I win—and the kid goes ape shit. She knocked the board over. ‘Baaaaaaa!’ I was, like, ‘Shit, the kid’s like me. Damn it.’”
Gigi was a blossoming young basketball talent and Kobe loved nothing more than talking about her exploits and how she "verbally committed" to UCONN to play college basketball and wanted to play in the WNBA.
Kobe was a recent guest on Showtime’s All The Smoke with Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson, and he talked about how Gigi’s love and curiosity for the game got him interested in the game again after he retired.
The daddy-daughter duo have been inseparable in recent years. They would fly all over the country to watch basketball at all levels, men and women.
In a video that went viral, Kobe and Gigi attended the Atlanta Hawks vs. Nets game in Brooklyn last month (December 21).
Kobe is seen breaking down the finer points of the game, and Gigi makes a correct assessment to which her father knowingly and lovingly nods in approval.
He once famously joked on Jimmy Kimmel Live about what Gigi would say when people told him he needed a son to carry on his basketball legacy.
"The best thing that happens is when we go out, and fans will come up to me and she'll be standing next to me, and they'll be like 'You gotta have a boy, man. You and [Vanessa] gotta have a boy. Have somebody carry on the tradition, the legacy."
"And she's like, 'Oh! I got this! You don't need no boy for that, I got this,'" Mamba laughed.
That unwavering self-confidence, she is her father's daughter.
R.I.P. Gigi and Kobe. Prayers up to Vanessa, Natalia, Bianka and Capri.
