The Lakers will reportedly unveil the second Kobe Bryant Statue at Crypto.com Arena on Friday in a private event before making the statue public on Saturday.
When the Lakers unveiled Kobe Bryant’s statue on Feb. 8 of this year, they shockingly announced that it was one of three statues to be revealed to honor the late Kobe Bryant.
The first was a reference to his 81-point game against the Toronto Raptors and the following two were to be announced and revealed at a later date.
According to ESPN’s Dave McMenamin, the second statue will be revealed on Friday at a private event before being made available to the public on Saturday.
A statue depicting Kobe Bryant and daughter Gianna “Gigi” Bryant will be unveiled in a private tented ceremony Friday outside of Crypto.com Arena, sources told ESPN.
The statue is the second of three planned monuments to the Los Angeles Lakers legend, who died in a tragic helicopter crash along with Gigi and seven others in January 2020.
The first statue has been a crowd favorite, with hundreds of fans gathering around it before and after Lakers games. This second statue will likely garner similar attention, and it will be fascinating to see what image they choose to honor Kobe and Gianna “Gigi” Bryant.
Hopefully, the statue unveiling will go smoothly. Last time, some misspellings were publicly discovered, which the Lakers quickly remedied.
Having two statues outside of Crypto.com Arena for any player is unheard of, but three demonstrates how much the city of Los Angeles and the Lakers organization love and honor Kobe.
Adding Gigi to the statue is a great way to honor her life; it feels right since he was such a “Girl Dad.”
Vanessa Bryant, Stu Lantz, Lakers owner Jeanie Buss, Derek Fisher, Phil Jackson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar delivered speeches at the first statue unveiling.
With this being the offseason and many people at the Paris Olympics focusing on USA Basketball, perhaps this presentation will be more reserved.
With this statue being unveiled on 8/2/24, all numbers associated with Kobe and Gigi, one has to wonder if they’ll try and get the third statue unveiled later this month on 8/24, also known as “Mamba Day’.
Or they can go with the day before, as that is Kobe’s official birthday.
Regardless, Lakers fans and the NBA world will watch and celebrate Kobe and Gigi’s legacy wheneveGigi’s do it.