RIP KOBE BRYANT

Man, it’s so hard to start the year off like this, because I always look to the first month of the year being a good one.

Can we just talk about the man’s life for a minute? I would rather not dive into his passing, I’m sure the news is going to do that for us.

Kobe Bryant was (wow, writing that really felt horrendous) my generation’s Michael Jordan. Not saying he was Michael’s equal, but damn did he have us believing that he could be. He embodied everything that Michael did, but did it only a notch below MJ. We grew with him, laughed with him, got frustrated with him, watched him win and lose, and grow into a superstar that transcended the sport of basketball like few others have done. I can’t count how many times I’ve shot a shot on the court, and said “KOBE!” Or taking a step back and shouting “T-Mac!” I even wore the sock (I thought I’d was a damn sock) on my left calf to emulate his compression sleeve he wore. They were a huge part of my life. And because I grew up on the other coast, I always rooted against Kobe, even though I knew that most of the time it was foolish to do so. He had the kind of will you tell your kids about, the kind of relentless determination that can only be found in a few people around the world. Not even being a Laker fan, I can say that I watched close to every game he played in, because I was such a basketball fan that I HAD to watch. I find myself on highlights and being like, “Damn, I watched that game when he did that. I remember it like it was on last night.”

Like this one.

Or this one.

Or this one.

I watched them all, and was amazed.
Kobe was the basketball superhero for our generation, a man who had his faults, and never backed down from them. A man who continued to show us that barriers and roadblocks can be conquered. He gave us a sense that he could any and everything he willed himself to do, even if nobody else felt like he could. He wasn’t afraid to be the scapegoat, the pariah, the failure. When he won, you half expected him to do so, because it almost felt improbable that he would allow himself to lose, much the same of MJ. And when he did lose, you could see the fire in his stomach that told you that wasn’t going to happen again. Losing wasn’t something he accepted, and he rarely did it. And now he’s gone.
Him and his beautiful daughter.

Gone.

RIP Kobe Bryant.