And just like that, Kobe Bryant is dead. 41 is no age to die, not if you are a specimen of athletic prowess, not if you have only recently left the stage that you lit up for two decades, and not if you are just beginning the second phase of your journey, where an entire sport looks towards you for mentorship.
How do you explain that Kobe Bryant, the Kobe Bryant, is no more?
Athletes, especially those of Kobe’s stature, embody the physical peaks that their generation aspires for. In our minds, their athleticism is the metal armour that keeps them secure from all physical risks, never mind death; their dance with mortality can happen only once the rust of age starts setting. Basketball is a sport that demands as much physical mastery of air as the ground, and there is a terrible play of irony in one of its greatest dying from a helicopter crash.
In the hours after the tragic news broke out, tributes and condolence messages have come from every direction, even those towards which his sport never ventured. That’s the kind of impact Kobe’s ilk have- they transcend cultures. My own relationship with Kobe Bryant was strictly digital. Highlight packages and YouTube videos are the only interactions I have ever had with his greatness. And yet, I, and millions of others, didn’t have to know the three seconds rule to be aware of what he achieved and what he symbolised for basketball, sport, and his community. Even if I never woke up at the break of dawn to watch him do his thing, I still felt like I knew Kobe.
Kobe Bryant’s legacy, irrespective of what happened last night, will never be limited to the basketball court. His was a career that will be celebrated beyond his career tally and PPG average. You only need to listen to the messages from the basketball community to understand the picture of inspiration and hope he was. Kobe typified what it meant to be a star athlete in the technicolor multimedia era. For a decade, he defined his sport. Cameras and mics followed him everywhere he went and yet, season after season, his numbers never dipped. Fame can wear people down and lead them astray; Kobe Bryant wore his like a lightweight jacket.
Kobe also did that thing all greats do — make greatness look easy and natural. His greatness lay as much in his ability with a million eyes on him and as in his dedication, drive, and deference to his craft when no one was looking. There is a story about him training all night during an off-season camp for the USA Olympic team that should be narrated to every one of us who take such brilliance for granted.
Sport is a profession of high expectations and diminishing returns — Sachin Tendulkar crossed a half-century only one out of every three times he went to bat and Lionel Messi misplaces more shots than he scores with. Yet, it hasn’t taken a lot for us to call Sachin or Messi the most unreasonable things for failing at an important hurdle, as if none of us ever fall or, to use Twitter vocabulary, bottle it. Kobe Bryant’s death is a nudge to all of us for cherishing athletes while we have the chance, because ever so often, all we’ll be left with are tributes after they’re long gone.
The late poet and singer Jim Carroll once wrote — “In basketball, you can correct your mistakes immediately, and mid-air.” Never have those words found poignancy like they do today. Rest in peace, Kobe.