Rob Pelinka Speaks at A Celebration of Life for Kobe and Gianna Bryant

Our next speaker is the general manager of the Los Angeles Lakers, he was previously Kobe's agent and, most notably for our purposes today, is one of Kobe's best and closest friends and GG's godfather, please welcome to Rob Palinka. The world knows Kobe as a basketball legend. but I have been lucky enough to know him much more over 20 years. The Kobe I know had three unique sides that I hope to quickly honor today Kobe the best friend, Kobe the father, and Kobe the husband. I'll start with Kobe, the best friend. Do you remember where you were on that foggy, sunless morning of January 26 when the axis of the world seemed to shift forever for all of us?

I was at Sunday church with my family, my phone was deep in my jeans pocket when I felt the familiar text message buzz for a second. I ignored the notification because I was at church, but for some reason with this text message I felt a sudden urge to check my phone. I pulled it out of my jeans and discovered the text was from Kobe. There was nothing unusual or unfamiliar with this over the past two decades. Kobe and I talked or texted every day because that's what best friends do at the time. My instincts were to hang up the phone and return to the preacher's sermon, but a gentle push from another world forced me to open it.

Reading the text, I quickly saw that Kobe was asking me if I knew a certain baseball agent based in Southern California, since Kobe's question didn't have any urgency, I decided to wait until after church to answer, but then again there was a gentle push. I grabbed my phone and texted Kobe back telling him that he had seen the baseball agent at a Lakers game the other night and that he was happy to help him with whatever he wanted. It was already a little after 9:30. He came back explaining his desire to help a friend of his get an internship at a baseball agency for one of his young daughters.

Kobe vouched for the girl's intellect and work ethic. He clearly wanted to advocate for a bright future for her. I texted Kobe back and told him I would do it. I put a plan in place to help him achieve it. A few minutes later, Koby, Gianna and seven other beautiful Souls ascended to heaven. Kobe had been texting me from the helicopter, the girl in that chain saying he wanted to help so badly. She was Lexi Altobelli, the surviving daughter of coach John l2 Belly, who was also in the helicopters. Kobe's last human act was heroic. He wanted to use his platform to bless and shape the future of a young girl.

Hasn't Kobe done that for all of us? Kobe was literally. The best friend anyone could ask for, he always passionately defended and celebrated the achievements of others and downplayed his own, the man who had won multiple NBA titles, MVP and an Oscar, vibrated with excitement when someone he loved reached even a simple goal with any achievement. Kobe was always the first to say that this was one of his greatest gifts as a friend and something I will always miss. There is a story that shows this beautiful side of Kobe, as shared by Vanessa in the years after he retired.

Kobe was often one of the first to share the ride. Picking up their daughters from school with Kobe in pole position, my children who attended the same school also saw him often, every time they saw him he would greet them enthusiastically if they had just one student of the year the other day. My nine year old daughter Emery had big tears in her eyes because she missed my uncle Kobe and gg so much when I asked her why she said that daddy, every time Kobe saw me, he would run to me and pick me up in his giant arms. and he lifted me high above his head.

Kobe always made me feel like she was the queen of the world. Kobe had a deep care for people that is unparalleled, he made every moment magical, as if he were living a fantasy novel, this was the case when my family and the Bryants went camping or, rather, on a trip to Montana, we canoed and rode horses, went fly fishing and river rafting and rode a stagecoach to a campfire dinner under the stars around every corner. Coby made everything an adventure, especially for the kids. and of course, with all the nature activities we did, they had to be done to the nth degree, if it was fly fishing, we had to learn to tie our own flies and fish standing in the stream with heavy waiter's boots, without shortcuts.

Kobe's enthusiasm and joy for all things in

life

made that trip once in a

life

time. Another notable quality of Kobey's friendship is that he mastered the art of doing the things his friends loved, things he loved when he got the Lakers general manager job. Kobe used to say that my life and his life had changed instead of him. Now I was the one with the Lakers' regimented schedule of scrimmages and road trips. I was now the only one commuting on the 405 from OSI to Los Angeles. On the other hand, Kobe was at home relaxing in Newport Beach. doing all of his Kobe ink work from his favorite place in the world after having lived through the demands of the NBA for 20 years, Kobe understood the toll this would take on my family time, so he and Vanessa spoke regularly with me. wife and my children to make sure everything was fine and I even celebrated holidays like Halloween with them, that's what friends do.

Kobe lived to improve other people's lives until his last text message the day after Kobe left. He was home and I felt totally lost. Could not. I imagine life without the strength and guidance of my best friend as part of my grief. I felt an overwhelming need to connect with something tangible that represented our friendship. An image of a voice message. Something Kobe left behind. My wife. He reminded me of the Wiz. An art book written by Kobe. and he had recently given it to me. I went upstairs and found the book in my library, I opened it and on the inside cover he had written with his own pen these for RP, my brother, may you always remember to enjoy the journey, especially when it is a Tough love Kobe Kobe wrote to me these words just a few months ago and now I realized that maybe they were meant for all of us Kobe, my brother, this path is very, very difficult and I don't know how to continue without you, but I know.

You want us to continue in our memories with you, you will give us strength to move forward somehow and, as you wrote, even in the valley of unimaginable loss, we will somehow find a way to have joy in the next side of Jacobi, Kobe, the father, when Kobe retired. When playing basketball, people often asked me how I thought I would boost his competitive drive. The answers came in a couple of surprising ways. The first was in a new sport, tennis, right after Kobe stopped playing for the Lakers, we started playing tennis at a local private club. club in Newport Beach we started having epic one-on-one battles.

I learned the game faster than him from the beginning, he often fell behind and that didn't sit well with Kobe, so what does the Black Mamba do next? When I got to the club, he was waiting for me sweating while his tennis skills exploded. I found out that he had secretly contacted the club pro for private lessons and he didn't share anything with me. Typical Mamba mentality. We loved our games, the stories and memories we shared on those beautiful California days. It was during one of those tennis conversations that his other new competitive love became so clear: coaching Gianna's youth basketball team.

Kobe constantly talked about his dream of creating the best. youth women's basketball team on the planet and she did it, it started with her individual work with Gigi and quickly spread to all the girls on Team Mamba, long practices every night, precision and everything that the individual practices, the set plays, the triangle cuts the defensive schemes, that was all. Kobe's masterpiece that I will never forget. Kobe challenged my 12-year-old son's all-star team to a game against his Mamba team. Yes, girls against boys. Kobe set up the game in a local high school gym with referees, timekeepers and everything he coached from the bench, but rarely. he said anything instead the mambas were so well prepared that they worked like a Swiss watch everything seemed written and conversant our boys were devastated Kobe and GG took it all in stride that's what the mambas do Kobe's love for training grew and grew and grew I remember when Kobe turned 40 to celebrate our families flew to Cabo for a long weekend at one of the most beautiful ocean properties in the world.

What was the one thing Kobe wanted to do in this heavenly environment? Watching the film of the Mamba team game with Gigi and I, of course, breaking up. On every play, Kobe's love and passion for this team was the perfect representation of how deeply he loved his daughters. At the center of all of this was her beautiful Gigi, who my wife and I are lucky enough to be godparents from the moment Kristen and I got dressed. Gigi in the pure white lace baptismal dress of hers when she was a child, kicked and moved into our world as only a Taurus can.

Gigi was an incredible combination of strength, courage, grace and dignity with a witty sense of humor that was simply captivating. She smiled with her. bright eyes and was literally everything good in the world in our home Gianna and her sister Natalia had become the gold standard of character and kindness. Gigi was love and grace and like her father, her life was about blessing others, simply put, Gigi was from Kobe. She took pride and joy on the basketball court and you could see with every move she made if basketball was the love that Kobe shared with Gigi and Nani.

Kobe shared a love of telling stories, the two seemed to live scenes from the most beautiful movie ever made. Cobia Nanny had a common language based on joy and inspiration. They could remember and recite movie lines and sing Disney songs. They always filled a room with smiles and laughter. Cobia Nanak Nanny created her own soundtrack to life, it seemed, and they could often be found on it. dancing all their days together around little children Kobe was like Santa Claus dressed in everyday clothes. Kobe had an unparalleled energy to light up kids and make them smile, laugh and love in my years as his agent.

I was told that he was one of the most grandiose. celebrities making a wish of our generation When Kobe met a boy who made a wish It was like heaven descended into the real world, this exuberant sense of play captured the way Kobe would love and father his daughter Bibi as if Kobe Bibi Was a Child of Wonder, Bibi's every moment seems born of joy, excitement and wonder, and Kobe had the ability to enter that world with her. Kobe also had an energy level that would match babies when the two played. I imagined a world to come.

I live where toy animals would dance, teacups would sing and rainbows would shine. I'd never seen anything like the two of them playing together. If you think Kobe's hands were good with the basketball, you should see what his hands were like with his daughter Coco, he literally had the The golden touch watching him hug and put Coco to sleep and caress her made you realize how tender he was. It was Kobe, he is literally the baby whisperer and in his arms is where you would find Coco always content with peace. Kobe would never miss a detail of his daughter.

He lives when he traveled with me for work he spent hours on the phone connecting and listening to the stories of the days he simply loved his daughters and there was nothing in the world that meant more to him. I remember being in the tunnel with Kobe, right? there the last time he wore his purple and gold suit, Kobe fist bumped each of his daughters before running out of the tunnel and in Mamba Speaks he said something like this is what you do when the world tells you you can't do it anymore. Do it, Kobe. sixty points and winning the night alone is only overshadowed by his love for his family as the world's greatest father.

The final side of Kobe, the husband when God created Kobe, the next great act of his was modeling Vanessa. I know this because they match perfectly and I have had a front row seat to witness his love for 20 years. I remember all the way from his wedding day in 2001, in typical Kobe fashion, he wanted to master every detail of that day to reflect his love for Vanessa. One of the things he was most excited about was carrying Vanessa across the threshold of her house as husband and wife for the first time. Vanessa brought out Kobe's romantic side like no one else in the world loved celebrating her holidays with her. birthday, anniversary and especially Valentine's Day, she would often call me to brainstorm her amazing ideas for special gifts from her and romantic occasions with her.

He even loved writing poems and letters to her and turning them into beautiful scrapbooks. Simply put, Kobe's love for Vanessa was energy. For his life, one story in particular captures the depth of Kobe's love forVanessa. There was a period of days when work trips caused Kobe to be away from Vanessa for longer than he wanted. She called me to explain how difficult this period was for him one night. Over the phone, Kobe noticed that there was a grand piano in the hotel suite where he was staying. He left it behind. He sat by a high window under the moonlit sky during one of our calls.

He shared an idea with me. He said he hadn't been sleeping. a lot at night because he was visiting missing Vee and the girls so much while he was away that he wanted to live in his love for Vanessa so at night, under the moonlit sky, he committed to learning by ear to play the first movement from Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. When he told me this I thought there was no way to know that he was not a trained musician and that it was a really difficult piece of music to play, but Kobe's and Vanessa's passion was combined with the patience and concentration that only the black mamba has done this.

A seemingly impossible goal, a reality, the next morning they called me and they played the first bars for me the next morning. By the end of the week, he had mastered the entire piece and played it over the phone without a single mistake in my heart. I knew that moment was one of Kobe's greatest feats because of his deepest love. Kobe had mastered one of the greatest piano movements ever written as a symbol of one of the most beautiful loves the world had ever seen too close. I'll say this just as the sun shines. the moon to guide us through the night Kobe and Gigi will continue to shine the light on us all, but unlike the sun, Kobe and Gigi's fuel will never go out because their light is eternal.

Yes, the axis of our world shifted that awful morning a few weeks ago, but with the moonlight of Kobe and Gigi we will never have to live. In the darkness of the night again we will all continue our journey until one day we will be together in heaven again and this time it will be forever. I love you dear Kobe and beautiful Gigi we love you Vanessa Nonnie Bibi Coco and we are here for you a lot of attention until the end of our days