The untimely passing of Kobe Bryant is something that hit hard, not just for every Los Angeles Lakers fan, but the entire sports world. But perhaps few could have experience true pain as much as Lakers owner Jeanie Buss.
Buss formed a bond with Bryant as early as his rookie season, way back in 1996. She met him when he was just a charismatic rookie, taking him out to lunch and bonding over their mutual affinity with Italy. By his final year with the Lakers, Kobe trusted only Jeanie Buss to be able to facilitate his goodbye tour from the NBA.
The Lakers owner recently spoke out to Jon Gold of the New York Times on how she still hasn't gotten over the death of Kobe Bryant, and probably never will. Jeanie Buss bared her emotions as she spoke on the Mamba following his induction into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.
“It’s almost like having to put him away again,” she said, her voice cracking. “He’s going into the Hall, and it’s like we’re leaving him there. It’s hard. It’s hard to go through this again.”
“I guess,” she added, “you just don’t get over it.”
Buss also detailed how the Lakers star set up a lunch between the two of them and his daughter Gianna. The story had her choked up as she told it.
“Once, he asked her out to lunch and brought Gianna. He said he wanted his daughter to learn from a powerful female sports executive; Buss now believes that was only a ruse, that Bryant just wanted Buss to know how important she was, to him and to the team.”
Hearing these little anecdotes on the Lakers legend never gets easier. But with people like Jeanie Buss and other continuing to speak up about Kobe Bryant well after his passing, his memory continues to resonate with us even further.
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