Bryant, Kobe

Subterms

    Latest story

    100 Shares189 Views

    Djokovic Honors Kobe Bryant With ‘Mamba Forever’ Shirt

    by

    Moments after Novak Djokovic won the U.S. Open men’s singles final on Sunday night, he pulled a T-shirt out his bag and put it on.The shirt said “Mamba Forever” and had an image of Djokovic together with Kobe Bryant, the Los Angeles Lakers star who died in a helicopter crash in 2020 with one of his daughters and seven others.Across the back, the shirt also had a No. 24, which Bryant used for 10 seasons with the Lakers (he also used No. 8 for 10 seasons).Djokovic said in an interview on the court during the trophy ceremony that the idea for the tribute came as he realized his 24th Grand Slam singles title was within reach, giving him a chance to connect with a meaningful number from Bryant’s career.“I thought 24 is the jersey that he wore when he became a legend of Lakers and world basketball,” Djokovic said. “So I thought it would be a nice symbolic thing to acknowledge him.”Djokovic added that he had a close relationship with Bryant and often sought the basketball star’s advice, especially as he tried to recover from injuries.Many athletes have praised Bryant over the years for his relentless drive, nicknamed the Mamba Mentality, which he showed repeatedly as he pursued N.B.A. championships (he won five) and tried to show himself to be the best player on the court.“We chatted a lot about the winner’s mentality,” Djokovic said. “He was one of the people that I relied on the most. He was always there for any kind of counsel, advice, any kind of support in a most friendly way.”Djokovic’s shirt is not the first ode to Bryant from a U.S. Open winner. When Naomi Osaka won the tournament in 2020, defeating Victoria Azarenka, she returned to the court after her match to pose for a picture with her trophy wearing a No. 8 Bryant jersey.“I wore this jersey every day after my matches,” Osaka said on Instagram. “I truly think it gave me strength. Always.” More

    More stories

    • 125 Shares129 Views

      in Basket

      Vanessa Bryant Settles Helicopter Crash Photos Lawsuit for $28.85 Million

      by

      Bryant, the widow of the basketball star Kobe Bryant, sued Los Angeles County after some of its employees shared graphic photos of the crash that killed her husband and one of their daughters.Los Angeles County agreed to pay Vanessa Bryant and three of her daughters nearly $30 million to settle a lawsuit and potential claims over the sharing of graphic photos of the January 2020 helicopter crash that killed Bryant’s husband, the basketball star Kobe Bryant, and one of their daughters, according to a court filing on Tuesday. The settlement includes $15 million a jury awarded Vanessa Bryant in August, with additional funds to settle potential claims from her daughters.“Today marks the successful culmination of Mrs. Bryant’s courageous battle to hold accountable those who engaged in this grotesque conduct,” Luis Li, Bryant’s lawyer, said in a statement. “She fought for her husband, her daughter, and all those in the community whose deceased family were treated with similar disrespect. We hope her victory at trial and this settlement will put an end to this practice.”On Jan. 26, 2020, Kobe Bryant, 41, and his daughter Gianna Bryant, 13, were in a helicopter with seven other people when it crashed in foggy conditions outside Los Angeles, killing all on board. Soon after, Vanessa Bryant learned that some employees of the county’s fire and sheriff’s departments had shared graphic photos of human remains from the crash. She sued for negligence and invasion of privacy in September 2020 and won at trial in August, providing a rare and expensive public admonition of some of Los Angeles’ most powerful institutions.The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors agreed to pay Bryant’s family $28.85 million to settle Bryant’s lawsuit and potential future claims by Bryant and her daughters: Natalia, 20, Bianka, 6, and Capri, 3. The jury in August awarded Bryant $16 million, which was later reduced by $1 million because of a clerical error.In a statement, Mira Hashmall, the lead trial counsel for Los Angeles County in Bryant’s case, called the settlement “fair and reasonable” and said all county-related litigation from the crash had been resolved.“We hope Ms. Bryant and her children continue to heal from their loss,” Hashmall said.Kobe Bryant, who starred for the Los Angeles Lakers for 20 years before retiring in 2016, was on his way to coach Gianna’s basketball team at his Mamba Sports Academy in Thousand Oaks, Calif., when they boarded the helicopter on the day of the crash. The pilot, Ara Zobayan, became disoriented in the clouds and crashed into a hill near Calabasas, Calif., killing all nine people on board.In a deposition for her lawsuit, Vanessa Bryant said Rob Pelinka, the Lakers’ general manager and Kobe Bryant’s former agent, drove her later that morning to a sheriff’s station in Malibu, near the crash scene.Alex Villanueva, who was the Los Angeles County sheriff at the time, confirmed the deaths and asked Bryant if he could do anything for her, she said.“And I said: ‘If you can’t bring my husband and baby back, please make sure that no one takes photographs of them. Please secure the area,’” Bryant said during the deposition. “And he said: ‘I will.’ And I said: ‘No, I need you to get on the phone right now and I need you to make sure you secure the area.’”Bryant testified at trial that she learned from a Los Angeles Times report that a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy had showed photos of the crash at a bar. The existence of the photos, Bryant said, compounded the tragedy.“I live in fear of my daughters being on social media and these popping up,” Bryant testified.The pictures were primarily shared between employees of the Los Angeles County sheriff’s and fire departments.Lawyers for the county acknowledged that the photos were taken and shared, but argued that an immediate order to delete them kept them from being publicly disseminated.At the trial, the jury also awarded $15 million to Chris Chester, who joined the suit because his wife Sarah, 45, and daughter, Payton, 13, were killed in the crash. Los Angeles County agreed to pay the Chester family an additional $4.95 million to resolve any future claims.Two other families separately settled with the county over the photos for $1.25 million each in October 2021.Li previously said that Bryant would donate the proceeds from the lawsuit to her Mamba & Mambacita Sports Foundation, which honors Kobe and Gianna Bryant. More

    • 138 Shares99 Views

      in Basket

      Like a Record, LeBron James’s Age Is Just a High Number

      by

      Still among the best players in the N.B.A. at 38, James is now 36 points away from the league’s career scoring record. He could break it at home on Tuesday.NEW ORLEANS — LeBron James headed into Saturday night’s game against the New Orleans Pelicans needing 63 points to break the N.B.A. career scoring record. It was a large number for anyone to reach in a single game, especially a 38-year-old in his 20th N.B.A. season.And yet spectators wearing purple-and-gold jerseys and T-shirts displaying James’s No. 6 flooded Canal and Bourbon Streets ahead of Saturday’s game, and then they piled into the Smoothie King Center, most of them hoping to witness N.B.A. history.Larry Unrein, a New York native who traveled to three of the Lakers’ last four games, came to New Orleans a day after his 40th birthday, hoping for a belated gift.“He could break it, dude,” Unrein said before the game. “He’s 38, and he’s playing like he’s 24. I turned 40 yesterday and aspire to take care of my body, drink tons of water and stretch.” Unrein, who skateboards in his free time, said James was inspiring him to skate into old age.An employee at the arena named Anita, who would not give her last name but said she had been working there for 10 years, was nervous that the record might be broken on the Pelicans’ home floor. “We can’t let him do it here,” she said. “It ain’t about the King tonight.”No one, really, should have thought that James, at this point in his career, would score 63 points on Saturday. (His career high is 61 points, in a game against Charlotte in 2014.) But James has provided many miracles in his career. That he is competing at such a high level at 38 seems to be just one more — a feat that is altering perceptions of athletic limits and athletic primes.James fell short of the scoring record on Saturday, finishing with 27 points, 9 rebounds and 6 assists, and the Lakers (25-29) lost to the Pelicans (27-27), 131-126. James is now 36 points away from passing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who scored 38,387 points from 1969 to 1989, and tickets for the Lakers’ home game against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Tuesday night have soared in anticipation that James will break the record then.On Saturday, James made plays that explained why many supporters will always believe that another miracle is on its way. He played 40 minutes, more than any of his teammates. It was the third time in his last four games that he played at least 40 minutes, a figure, he said, that was “catching up to him.”“I’m tired as hell,” he said after the game. “But I’ll be ready to go on Tuesday.”“I think it’s historic on a lot of different levels,” Lakers Coach Darvin Ham said earlier this season. “For him to be at this point of his career and still able to produce at the level in which he’s producing, I just think all of us, just really being able to witness it, be a part of it — it shows his competitive spirit, his no-quit mentality.”A moment of “How is LeBron doing this at this age?” came in the third quarter, with the Lakers leading by 7 and forward Herbert Jones barreling toward the rim. James took a charge, flying onto his back from the impact of Jones’s crashing into him. Many N.B.A. players, especially stars and older players, are reluctant to take a charge, given the risk of injury or, more simply, the wear and tear on the body over a long season. Even Kobe Bryant, who was known for his toughness and mentality when he played for the Lakers, was publicly against taking charges.Bryant’s reasoning was that great players such as Scottie Pippen and Larry Bird were injured after taking many charges throughout their careers, while others, including Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson, didn’t take charges and avoided significant long-term injuries.But there was James, nearly 40, taking a charge on a player listed at 6 feet 7 inches and 206 pounds.James plunged into the crowd after diving for a loose ball.Emily Kask for The New York TimesWith just under three minutes remaining in Saturday’s game and the Lakers losing by 4, James dived for a ball heading out of bounds, launching himself above courtside fans. It was the second time he had done so in recent weeks. He did not save the ball, but players of his age and status would be excused for not even making the effort. James would not excuse himself: There he was, his blue-and-pink shoes among the fans’ faces in the crowd.“I think it inspires them out there to do their jobs,” Ham said this season about the impact of James’s play on his teammates.James aggressively attacked the basket throughout the night, bumping and fighting through fouls to make layups and sprinting past players for scores. On multiple occasions, younger teammates passed up layup opportunities to give the ball to their much older, but somehow much more explosive, teammate, who threw down dunks that ignited fans, many who wore his jersey and some who wore New Orleans colors.James was not perfect. He often settled for 3-point shots, including an off-balance one late in the game, which he missed and seemed foolish to take. He finished 1 for 7 from long range. Defensively, he, like his teammates, did little to stop the Pelicans’ 42-point barrage in the third quarter, which sparked their win.As James went to the free-throw line with 18 seconds left and the Lakers losing by 6, he missed his first attempt. If the game wasn’t over already, it was effectively over after that.But Anita, the stadium worker, wasn’t buying it. She thought James was too good to miss a free throw. This had to be part of a script: “He’s just doing that,” she said, “so he could get that record in L.A.” More

    • 125 Shares99 Views

      in Basket

      This Isn’t Who the Lakers Are Supposed to Be. Right?

      by

      The Lakers have long been seen as a glamour franchise of big names and big wins. LeBron James is dominating. But the wins have been much harder to come by, for a while.LOS ANGELES — LeBron James fidgeted as he answered questions after a second consecutive frustrating Lakers loss in which he thought the referees had missed a potential game-altering foul call.He was terse and dismissed a question about scoring his 38,000th career point in the N.B.A., something only he and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar have done. He was asked if he thought much about what the Lakers’ many losses in recent seasons meant to the franchise.“No,” James said. Then he turned and sped out of the locker room, into a rainy Los Angeles night.The gloom outside reflected the mood in the building.For decades, the Lakers defined themselves as one of the N.B.A.’s glamour franchises — a place the biggest stars went to play, win championships and achieve basketball immortality. Making the playoffs was an expectation, not an accomplishment.Then 10 years ago, two seismic events shook the franchise. On Feb. 18, 2013, Jerry Buss, who bought and revitalized the Lakers in 1979, died at age 80, leaving the franchise to a trust controlled by his six children, some of whom would wrestle for control of the team. Less than two months later, as he tried to drag the Lakers into the playoffs, Kobe Bryant tore an Achilles’ tendon, the first in a string of injuries that would spell the end of his 20-year career.Since then, the Lakers have gone through several discordant phases, from Bryant’s return and retirement to chaos in the executive ranks to a championship in 2020 that seemed proof of purple-and-gold exceptionalism, no matter the obstacles.But new obstacles have the Lakers once again facing the question of whether the excellence they spent decades building can return. For the second year in a row, James, 38, is having to produce herculean efforts to try to pull his injury-plagued team out of the bottom of the Western Conference standings.LeBron James is averaging nearly 30 points a game at the age of 38 as he tries to power the injured and struggling Lakers to the playoffs.Jae C. Hong/Associated Press“We’re going to figure this thing out,” said Lakers Coach Darvin Ham, the team’s fifth in the past 10 years. “We’ll definitely figure this thing out.”‘Kobe realized that he could not win’If success is measured by championships, the Lakers have still been one of the top teams in the N.B.A. during the past decade. They are one of the six teams to have won championships since the 2012-13 season.Broadening the measure to playoff or regular-season success, the Lakers become less impressive. With only two playoff appearances since the 2012-13 season, the Lakers are in the bottom third of the league. Only two teams have been to the playoffs fewer times in that span — the Knicks (once) and the Sacramento Kings (none).By contrast, between 1960-61, the team’s first season in Los Angeles after moving from Minnesota, and 2012-13, the Lakers had missed the playoffs just four times.Frank Vogel coached the Lakers to their only two recent playoff appearances, guiding them to the championship in 2020 then a first-round loss in 2021. The Lakers fired him in April after they missed the playoffs.Even though injuries and roster construction played major roles in the Lakers’ struggles in the 2021-22 season, Vogel became a casualty of heightened expectations with James on board. James’s arrival as a free agent in July 2018 marked the first time since Bryant retired two years earlier that the Lakers had a transcendent star.Bryant had spent his whole career with the Lakers and won five championships. So even after his Achilles’ tendon injury, the Lakers rewarded him with a two-year contract extension worth $48.5 million, giving him the highest salary in the league at the time. They were confident that he deserved it no matter what happened next.To announce Bryant’s return from injury in late 2013, the Lakers created a video with dramatic music and an image of his jersey being battered by weather until a lightning bolt finally tore it. The video closes with the jersey having been mended by unseen means and with the words: “The Legend Continues.”Bryant returned for six games in December, then fractured his knee and missed the rest of the 2013-14 season as the Lakers won just 27 games. He missed most of the next season as the team won only 21 games.“At some point, I think it’s obvious to everyone that Kobe realized that he could not win,” said Gary Vitti, who was the Lakers’ head athletic trainer for decades until Bryant retired. “And once he realized he couldn’t win, then a lot of the stress and the pressure sort of came off him and he really started having fun and being a lot happier around the game and his teammates.”Kobe Bryant, who died in 2020, spent his entire 20-year career with the Lakers, though the final few seasons were rough. He scored 60 points in his final game in April 2016.Harry How/Getty ImagesOpposing fans feted him everywhere he went. They cheered the first shot he made, even if it took him a while to get there. Coach Byron Scott, a former Lakers guard, led the team during Bryant’s loss-filled farewell tour, a franchise-low 17-win season.“Losing — it’s horrible,” Vitti said. “But if you put it all in the context, if you’re Kobe, you know, basically Kobe could do whatever he wanted out there. Byron took over and kind of fell on his sword for the team. He said, let’s send Kobe out the way he wants to go.”Said Metta Sandiford-Artest, who played for the Lakers on their 2010 championship team and again from 2015-17: “At that point, you just wanted to make it comfortable for Kobe. That’s it. Nothing else really matters at that point.” He added: “He deserved it.”‘Pieces for the future’All the losing gave the Lakers enviable draft positioning.With picks earned by their records in the final few years of Bryant’s career, the Lakers drafted or acquired several promising young players, like Julius Randle, Jordan Clarkson, D’Angelo Russell, Larry Nance Jr., Brandon Ingram and Ivica Zubac.Randle, Clarkson, Russell and Nance have said they learned from Bryant’s example. But his star power was such that they had to wait until he retired in April 2016 for the franchise to focus on their development.“It felt like a career-beginning training camp because it definitely was not the pieces at the time you needed to win,” Sandiford-Artest said. “There was more, you know, pieces for the future.”Those players would not be part of their future, except as trade chips to build the championship roster.In the gap between Bryant and James, Jeanie Buss, the controlling owner, overhauled the front office and thwarted a coup attempt by her older brothers as the team’s losses — and external criticism — mounted.In the summer of 2017, the Lakers signed Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, who is represented by James’s agent and close friend, Rich Paul. That gave Paul an inside look at the organization a year before James became a free agent.Paul knew the situation wasn’t perfect, but few teams are. He advised James that signing with the Lakers could work, in part out of trust in Buss. James chose the Lakers and suddenly the drama of the past few seasons didn’t seem to matter.After missing the playoffs in James’s first season, when he dealt with a groin injury, the Lakers tried again. Magic Johnson, whom Buss had hired to run basketball operations and who had helped to recruit James, abruptly stepped down before the last game of the 2018-19 season. They traded several young players and draft picks to the New Orleans Pelicans for another Paul client: Anthony Davis. Rob Pelinka, the team’s vice president of basketball operations, said he consulted with James and Davis as he built the rest of the roster.The two stars were electrifying together. The rest of the team fit perfectly and charged through the coronavirus pandemic-interrupted season. When Bryant died suddenly in a helicopter crash in January 2020, James became the public face of the organization’s grief.Months later, James led the Lakers to the franchise’s 17th championship. Buss felt vindicated against those who had questioned her leadership.Jeanie Buss, the Lakers’ controlling owner, has faced criticism as the team has struggled. She oversaw the franchise’s 17th championship run, in 2020.Tracy Nguyen for The New York TimesOnstage as the team celebrated the victory, James enveloped Buss in a long embrace. He told her they had accomplished what they set out to do.“I think the hug for that long a time was to really let it soak in,” Buss told the Los Angeles Times at the time. “He’s won several championships now, and he knows that those moments are to be cherished and to be recognized.”But it was only one championship. They would soon tumble from their pedestal.‘Things are going to get right’This season is Ham’s first season with the Lakers, and it began disastrously.The team lost its first five games, and 10 of its first 12. Ham benched Russell Westbrook in October after three starts. Westbrook had struggled in his first season in Los Angeles last year.James has been a bright spot. In his 20th season, he has been playing like he is still in his 20s. He’s had trouble enjoying the chase for Abdul-Jabbar’s career scoring record as losses and injuries have piled up this season.Ham has remained optimistic.“I get disappointed, but I don’t get discouraged or down on myself or the team,” he said in an interview. “Yeah, there’s moments in games we should have won, or different moments we should have played better, but at the end of the day working in the N.B.A. for one of the most, if not the most storied franchise, having a lot of great people I get to work with, great people I’m working for. It’s been fun.”The Lakers lack depth, but there is evidence lately that, with the right additions, they can contend for a championship if they have Davis, who had been playing like a candidate for the league’s Most Valuable Player Award before his foot injury in mid-December. The Lakers went on a five-game winning streak starting Dec. 30 and recently they nearly beat two contenders — the Mavericks and the 76ers.Lakers guard Russell Westbrook, left, has had a rocky tenure in Los Angeles, but has found success coming off the bench this year. Coach Darvin Ham, right, pulled Westbrook from the starting lineup after three games.Mark J. Terrill/Associated PressThe trading deadline is Feb. 9, giving the Lakers until then to make a major move to get back on the championship track. But all of the trades of the last few years, particularly those for Davis and Westbrook, have left them with little flexibility and salary-cap space. They can’t trade any of their first-round picks until the 2027 selection, and have been reluctant to lose more draft assets.Ham said he has felt support from Pelinka and Buss, who signed Pelinka to a multiyear extension last year despite the team’s struggles. After a five-game road trip from Christmas to Jan. 2, Ham and Pelinka went to Buss’s office.“She gave me a big hug and told me: ‘Hang in there, you’re doing a phenomenal job and things are going to get right. We’re going to start winning consistently, but Darvin, we’re totally happy with what you’re doing and you and your staff are doing an excellent job,’” Ham said. “It was cool. It was really thoughtful.”Ham said the mood when he sees both Buss and Pelinka is light and full of smiles.“It’s not like a lack of an awareness, but just a gratefulness, a thankfulness to be in this together,” Ham said.He is being afforded patience, at least for now. More

    • 75 Shares149 Views

      in Basket

      ‘The Redeem Team’ Review: Squad Goals

      by

      A documentary looks at the 2008 U.S. men’s Olympic basketball team and its mission to bring back gold after a humiliating loss.As narratives of national uplift go, the 1992 U.S. Olympic men’s basketball consortium, known as the “Dream Team,” was one of the most shamelessly contrived. Once international players started to get the hang of hoops, how was America to maintain hegemony? Blitz them with the cream of the professional crop. This strategy wasn’t foolproof. A humiliating loss to Argentina in 2004 deprived the United States of the gold. This aggression would not stand.“The Redeem Team,” a documentary about the 2008 squad that was charged with getting the Americans back to the top spot, is smart in not asking the viewer to feel too bad for the 2004 group. The Argentine player Pepe Sanchez nailed the issue right after the match: “This is a team sport. You play five on five, not one on one.”Taking charge for the 2008 run is the Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, a figure both respected and despised (the team member LeBron James is frank: “Growing up in the inner city, you hate Duke”). Krzyzewski makes teamwork the priority, and he holds to that even when he brings aboard Kobe Bryant, then a notorious lone wolf.The movie, directed by Jon Weinbach, offers several eye-opening mini-narratives on the way to a rematch with Argentina. Doug Collins, a member of the U.S. team in 1972, speaks to the 2008 players about his painful experience in a game arguably stolen by the Soviet Union. Bryant softens up his old friend Pau Gasol, a member of Spain’s team, the better to execute a shocking “who’s the boss” move on the court. The intimidating presence of Argentina’s ace shooter Manu Ginóbili causes no small concern. While no realistic observer of American sports could call this movie inspirational, these sequences definitely make it engrossing.The Redeem TeamNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 37 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

    • 163 Shares139 Views

      in Basket

      Why LeBron James Is Worth $100 Million to the Lakers, Win or Lose

      by

      If all James did was win basketball games, that would be more than enough. But his value goes beyond the court.If one believes in science, historical trends and the limits of human capabilities, there’s a high likelihood that the 37-year-old LeBron James soon will no longer play like a superstar.After all, in the history of the N.B.A., few players were even in the league at that age, much less playing as well as he does. Last year with the Los Angeles Lakers, in his 19th season, James averaged 30.3 points a game, the second highest of his career and the most on the team. He was named an All-Star for the 18th time.James makes it look easy, but the short list of players who were competing at an All-Star level around James’s age shows that it is not: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone, John Stockton and Michael Jordan. Chris Paul, who turned 37 in May, may deserve to be on the list.Still, trends would suggest that the Lakers’ recent decision to sign James to a two-year, $97.1 million extension with a player option for a third year might not pay off on the court. The Lakers didn’t make the playoffs last season, and James played just 56 of 82 games because of injuries and rest. His contract will eat up a significant percentage of the team’s salary cap space, making it harder for the team to add other top-tier players. James has defied human limits thus far, but each year is a new chance for science to win.Yet deals like his are often unbound by the rules of basketball, finance or science.“There is a very strong emotional component as well,” Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, said in an email. “Professional sports are unlike any other business. You will not find the emotional attachment to players that Mavs and N.B.A. fans have, like they do to Dirk or LeBron or so many others, in any other business.”James’s connection with Los Angeles and Lakers fans can help explain why the team would sign him to a contract extension at an age when most stars have already retired.Chris Young/The Canadian Press, via Associated PressCuban employed his own franchise star in Dirk Nowitzki, who spent his whole career with the Mavericks, from 1998 to 2019. Nowitzki retired at 40 and received multiple late-career contracts for close to the maximum amount.“No one says they have a favorite programmer at Google or the person who updated their iOS at Apple is their all-time favorite and they have their trading card,” Cuban said. “I’m not saying all owners look at it this way, but I know quite a few of us do.”Cuban said he was influenced by Jerry Buss, a former owner of the Lakers, who in 1981 signed Magic Johnson to an unusual 25-year contract worth $25 million after just two seasons with the team. The Lakers also gave a 35-year-old Kobe Bryant a two-year extension worth $48.5 million in 2013 months after he had torn his Achilles’ tendon, keeping him as the highest-paid player in the N.B.A.“When someone has given as much to the organization as Dirk did for the Mavs, you just ask what he wants to do and do it,” Cuban said.This approach serves as a signal to stars on other teams that the Lakers are willing to keep them long-term. Bryant and Johnson, who each separately led the Lakers to five championships, helped recruit James to the Lakers, directly and indirectly.“It will speak volumes in terms of attracting people to that,” Julius Erving, the Hall of Fame guard and forward, said of James’s extension.There’s also a branding benefit for the Lakers in having James — or stars like Johnson and Bryant — associated with the team, said Rick Burton, a sports management professor at Syracuse University.“These are players that the Lakers want you to know: ‘These guys are with us. The best players in the world play for us,’” Burton said.Kobe Bryant’s final season with the Lakers wasn’t very good, but his final game was an all-out spectacle, full of celebrities and a roaring crowd.Harry How/Getty ImagesA souvenir jacket for Bryant’s last game was on sale for $5,824 at the Lakers’ arena.Lucy Nicholson/ReutersBut even if James soon is no longer among the best in the world, his contract is likely to pay off for the Lakers in ways beyond wins: on the business side.“Having his retirement date closer on the horizon creates a sense of urgency, and a scarcity effect,” Irina Pavlova, a former executive for the Nets, said in an email.She added: “I think of it the same way as if it were announced that ‘Hamilton’ only had four more weeks to run: All those people who have been delaying seeing it are now going to rush to do it, paying (even more) exorbitant prices for tickets, and probably buying commemorative playbills.”James has not said when he plans to retire, though it seems it may not be soon: He has said he wants to play with his 17-year-old son, LeBron James Jr., who is known as Bronny. And in a Sports Illustrated article this week, he hinted that he might want to play with his 15-year-old son, Bryce, too.Bryant retired after the last year of his two-year extension. The Lakers were among the worst teams in the N.B.A. those two years, and though outsiders criticized the deal, Bryant never seemed to lose the good will of Lakers fans and staff.“This is a year that’s dedicated to Kobe and his farewell,” Mitch Kupchak, then the Lakers’ general manager, said during Bryant’s final season.Fans flocked to Bryant’s games, hoping to catch a final glimpse of him and generating TV ratings and merchandise sales for the team. In his last game, the Lakers’ home arena reportedly sold more than $1.2 million in merchandise, including five cashmere diamond-encrusted Bryant baseball hats for $24,008. (Bryant wore the jersey numbers 8 and 24.)James has defied conventional wisdom, and science, that says he should not still be playing this well at his age. He averaged 30.3 points per game in 56 games last season.Ron Schwane/Associated PressEven if James is not retiring, he is just 1,325 points behind Abdul-Jabbar for first on the N.B.A.’s career scoring list, giving the Lakers an opportunity to cash in on that chase through apparel and other such sales. James has scored at least that many points in every season except 2020-21, when he played in just 45 games because of injuries. (The season was shortened by 10 games, to 72, because of the coronavirus pandemic.)Non-basketball factors make up “a small percentage” of decision making on contracts, said Rod Thorn, a former N.B.A. front office executive, who drafted Jordan with the Chicago Bulls. The Lakers, he said, want to be a strong basketball team because they have “a big rival on their doorstep” in the Los Angeles Clippers, who are expected to leave their shared arena by the 2024-25 season for their own venue.“It’s still a Laker town, but the Clippers may eclipse them as a team,” Thorn said, adding: “They want to have a great team. That’s how they get to where they want to go. That’s how they maximize the money they can take in. That’s how they maximize their brand.”Of course, if the Lakers continue to underwhelm, as they did last season, James’s contract could draw criticism much like Bryant’s extension did, even though James led the Lakers to a championship in 2020. Jeanie Buss, Jerry Buss’s daughter and the majority owner of the Lakers, declined to comment for this article. But James has long escaped the clutches of critics, and the Lakers have shown that, in special cases, they are willing to invest in their stars.“If we go back, it was Kobe, it was Magic, it was Kareem,” Erving said. “It was Wilt. It was Jerry West. Elgin Baylor was the greatest — he was my favorite. So they’ve always had a guy who fans locally and globally could identify with, and LeBron is that guy for the Lakers.” More

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Basket

      Read Los Angeles County’s Trial Brief in the Bryant Case

      by

      Case 2:20-cv-09582-JFW-E Document 367 Filed 08/03/22 Page 16 of 22 Page ID #:31186

      1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

      such as “high speed police chases”—the more demanding “purpose to harm” standard applies. Id. at 1137. When the officer’s conduct is more akin to negligence, courts have found such conduct insufficient to “shock the conscience.” For example, in Jones v. Jinparn, No. C 19-02817 SBA, 2020 WL 999806, at *4 (N.D. Cal. Mar. 2, 2020), the plaintiffs alleged that a police officer failed to make reasonable efforts to contact the decedent’s heirs before releasing the body for cremation. The court there reasoned that the officer’s conduct “sounds, at most, in negligence.” Id. at *5. “The Due Process Clause serves to protect the individual from the abuse of governmental power” and thus is not implicated by a negligent act. Id. By contrast, in Shelley v. County of San Joaquin, 996 F. Supp. 2d 921 (E.D. Cal. 2014), plaintiffs, who were the decedent’s family members, alleged that defendants violated their right to privacy by engaging in large-scale digging to exhume the decedent’s remains, which caused the remains to be “chewed up, pulverized, destroyed, crushed and commingled with other unknown murder victims” in the presence of the decedent’s mother and before news media. Id. at 931. The court concluded such conduct was likely to cause the family “profound grief” and therefore shocks the conscience. Id. (citation omitted). Here, the officers’ conduct at issue is more akin to that in Jones than in Shelley. First, with respect to the taking and internal sharing of photos among County personnel, the evidence will show that site photography at an incident is both appropriate and common practice in both the Fire and Sheriff’s Departments. Such photos are used, among other things, to provide intel, to assess the progress of an incident response, and to facilitate training post-incident. Indeed, some of the photos taken by County personnel here were shared with the NTSB to assist them in their investigation of the crash. With respect to Plaintiffs’ allegations that photos were shared with people outside the County or outside the confines of County business, Plaintiffs’ case is

      570887.2 11 DEFENDANTS’ TRIAL BRIEF More

    • 175 Shares109 Views

      in Basket

      Vanessa Bryant Is Suing L.A. County Over Kobe Bryant Crash Photos: What to Know

      by

      Bryant, whose husband and daughter died in a 2020 helicopter crash, said county employees shared photos of human remains from the crash, causing her emotional distress.Vanessa Bryant, the wife of the late basketball star Kobe Bryant, is expected to testify at a trial this week after she sued Los Angeles County and some of its agencies and employees for sharing photos of human remains from the helicopter crash that killed her husband and daughter.The January 2020 crash killed Mr. Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others as they traveled to a youth basketball tournament at Mr. Bryant’s academy in Thousand Oaks, Calif., northwest of Los Angeles.Mr. Bryant, 41, joined the N.B.A. out of high school, spending his entire 20-year professional career with the Los Angeles Lakers. He won five championships and retired in 2016 as one of the N.B.A.’s top career scorers and one of the world’s most popular sports figures.In her lawsuit, Mrs. Bryant accused Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies and fire department employees of negligence and invading her privacy by sharing crash photos “without any legitimate purpose.”From left to right, Kobe Bryant, Gianna Bryant, Vanessa Bryant and Natalia Bryant in November 2017. Kobe and Gianna were killed in a helicopter crash in 2020.Reed Saxon/Associated PressMrs. Bryant said she “has suffered (and continues to suffer) severe emotional distress” and that she feared that the photographs would appear online.“I do not want my little girls or I to ever have to see their remains in that matter,” Mrs. Bryant said during a deposition in October 2021. “Nor do I think it’s right that the photographs were taken in the first place because it’s already tough enough that I have to experience this heartache and this loss.”Mrs. Bryant has three other daughters with Mr. Bryant: Capri, 3; Bianka, 5; and Natalia, 19.Officials with Los Angeles County and the sheriff’s and fire departments have acknowledged that photos were shared, but said they were deleted.The trial began Aug. 10. Here is what else to know about Mrs. Bryant’s lawsuit.What caused the crash?More than a year after the crash, the National Transportation Safety Board determined that the pilot’s “poor decision” to fly at excessive speeds in foggy weather was the probable cause of the accident. The pilot, Ara Zobayan, was among those killed in the crash.[Read the 86-page final investigation report from the N.T.S.B., which includes a six-page executive summary.]The safety board found that Mr. Zobayan had become so disoriented in the clouds that he thought he was ascending when he was turning left just before the helicopter crashed into a hill near Calabasas, Calif.The board also faulted the charter company, Island Express Helicopters, for “inadequate review and oversight of its safety management processes.”Read Vanessa Bryant’s LawsuitBryant accused Los Angeles County and some of its agencies and employees of negligence and invasion of privacy for sharing photos of human remains at the helicopter crash that killed her husband and daughter.Read Document 41 pagesWho saw the photos? Where are the photos now?In a January court filing, Mrs. Bryant’s lawyers said close-up pictures of Mr. Bryant’s and Gianna Bryant’s remains “were passed around on at least 28 Sheriff’s Department devices and by at least a dozen firefighters,” including at a bar and an awards gala. In her lawsuit, Mrs. Bryant claimed that social media users had said they had seen the photos.Mrs. Bryant named four sheriff’s deputies in her lawsuit and accused them of sharing the photos with each other, other deputies or family members. The Los Angeles Times reported in February 2020 that one of the deputies — identified as Joey Cruz in Mrs. Bryant’s lawsuit — showed the photos at a bar, prompting a bar patron to file a complaint with the sheriff’s department.Emily Tauscher, a captain at the Los Angeles County coroner’s office, testified at trial that after the crash Mr. Bryant was identified by his skin tone and arm tattoos.Los Angeles County and law enforcement officials have said that the photos were deleted and never “made it into the public arena.”What has been the county’s response to the lawsuit?Lawyers representing Los Angeles County said that taking photographs of fatal crime and accident scenes was a common practice for investigative and information-sharing purposes.“The County continues to express its deepest sympathies for the families that suffered this terrible loss,” Mira Hashmall, the lead outside counsel for the county, said in a statement. “The County has also worked tirelessly for two and half years to make sure its site photos of the crash were never publicly disseminated. The evidence shows they never were. And that is fact, not speculation.”The county has not called any witnesses yet, but in a court filing its lawyers are pushing to include some of Mrs. Bryant’s Instagram posts at trial to counter her claims of severe emotional distress caused by the shared photos. Mrs. Bryant’s lawyers have said her posts on Instagram, where she has 15.5 million followers, are not relevant to this case.The disputed posts include Mrs. Bryant and her family on vacations. Mrs. Bryant also shared images of herself dressed as the Disney character Cruella de Vil from the “101 Dalmatians” movie franchise.“Plaintiff’s emotional state is at the center of this case, and there is little more revealing of Plaintiff’s emotional state than her own words about her life, sadness, the targets of her anger, her activities, and other stressors that could contribute to any emotional distress,” the county said in a court filing this month about trial exhibits.The Bryant family at Kobe Bryant’s jersey retirement ceremony in December 2017. Kobe Bryant spent 20 seasons with the Los Angeles Lakers.Allen Berezovsky/Getty ImagesWhat has happened so far during the trial?The trial, as anticipated, has been emotional.Mrs. Bryant wept during the opening statements made by her lawyer, Luis Li.The accounts provided by emergency medical workers who took graphic photographs are conflicting. Brian Jordan, a retired fired captain who said he was ordered to take photos of the crash scene, left the witness stand three times because he needed breaks to finish his testimony.“I do not remember what I took pictures of,” Jordan testified. “The way the whole scene looked, it’s going to haunt me forever.”Deputy Rafael Mejia, who is named in the lawsuit, testified he received 15 to 20 photographs from another deputy the day of the crash. He said he sent about 10 of the pictures to two deputies, including Joey Cruz, who later would share them in public with a bartender. Mejia expressed regret over sharing the photos, saying, “Curiosity got the best of us.”Cruz testified that he made a “misjudgment” when he shared the photos.Lakers General Manager Rob Pelinka, who was Gianna Bryant’s godfather and had been Mr. Bryant’s agent before becoming a team executive, detailed his relationship with Mrs. Bryant and testified about the anxiety she had experienced because of the shared photos.“She wants an air of love and joy and peace and she does everything she can do to preserve that,” Mr. Pelinka said. “You experience the grief from loss, but there’s also the anxiety from these deplorable actions.”What else did Mrs. Bryant say during her deposition?Mrs. Bryant said she learned of the accident when a family assistant knocked on her door in the late morning of Jan. 26, 2020. As she tried calling Mr. Bryant, notifications of people mourning Mr. Bryant popped up on her phone.Mrs. Bryant said she went to an airport in an attempt to secure a helicopter to take her to the crash site but was told the weather conditions were not safe. Mr. Pelinka drove Mrs. Bryant to the sheriff’s station in Malibu, near the crash site, she said.At the station, “no one would answer” questions about her husband and daughter, Mrs. Bryant said. She was escorted back and forth between rooms, and after a long wait, a pastor walked in and Sheriff Alex Villanueva entered with a publicist. Mrs. Bryant said she wanted privacy and asked the publicist to leave the room.Villanueva confirmed the deaths, Mrs. Bryant said, and asked if he could do anything for her.“And I said: ‘If you can’t bring my husband and baby back, please make sure that no one takes photographs of them. Please secure the area,’” Mrs. Bryant said during the deposition. “And he said, ‘I will.’ And I said, ‘No, I need you to get on the phone right now and I need you to make sure you secure the area.’”How much is Mrs. Bryant suing for?Mrs. Bryant is suing for compensatory and punitive damages.“That would be up to the jury,” Mrs. Bryant responded when asked during her deposition how much money she sought. “I don’t — I’m not asking for a dollar amount.”Are the families of other crash victims involved in Mrs. Bryant’s case?Christopher Chester, whose wife, Sarah, 45, and daughter, Payton, 13, died in the crash, is joining the lawsuit. Two other victims’ families settled for $1.25 million each last year.Has any other litigation involving the crash been settled?Mrs. Bryant and the family members of the other victims reached a settlement in June 2021 with Island Express Helicopters, its owner, Island Express Holding Corporation and the estate of Mr. Zobayan.Terms of the settlement were confidential.Vik Jolly and More

    • 50 Shares99 Views

      in Basket

      Read Vanessa Bryant’s Lawsuit

      by

      Case 2:20-cv-09582-JFW-E Document 54 Filed 03/17/21 Page 2 of 41 Page ID #:1137

      1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

      Plaintiff Vanessa Bryant (“Plaintiff”), through her undersigned counsel, hereby brings this action against defendants County of Los Angeles (the “County”), the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department (the “Sheriff’s Department”), the Los Angeles County Fire Department (the “Fire Department,” and, collectively with the County and the Sheriff’s Department, the “Entity Defendants”), Joey Cruz, Rafael Mejia, Michael Russell, and Raul Versales (collectively, the “Deputy Defendants,” and, collectively with the County, the Sheriff’s Department, and the Fire Department, the “Defendants”) seeking damages to remedy violations of rights under the United States Constitution and for negligence and invasion of privacy pursuant to California law. This Court has subject matter jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. sections 1331 and 1343. Plaintiff alleges, on personal knowledge as to herself and information and belief as to others, as follows: INTRODUCTION 1. On the morning of Sunday, January 26, 2020, three eighth-grade girls, joined by parents and coaches, left their homes in Orange County to play in a youth basketball tournament in Thousand Oaks. Making their way by helicopter, they encountered dense fog. Rather than land or turn around, the pilot pushed into the fog and became disoriented. The helicopter descended rapidly and crashed into the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains, killing everyone onboard. Vanessa Bryant’s thirteen year-old daughter, Gianna Bryant, and husband of nearly twenty years, Kobe Bryant, were among those who died. 2. In the aftermath of the crash, several of the victims’ family members gathered at the L.A. County Sheriff’s station in Lost Hills, devastated and distraught. Sheriff Alex Villanueva met with them and assured Mrs. Bryant that his deputies were securing the crash site. Based on a leak by law enforcement, the gossip and celebrity news site TMZ had reported that Kobe, a singular figure in

      Case No. 2:20-cv-09582-JFW-E FIRST AMENDED COMPLAINT More