The second in a planned three statues for Kobe Bryant outside Crypto.com Arena honors his work as a “girl dad” and memorializes his daughter, Gianna.
The statue shows Kobe and Gianna hugging while they sat courtside at a Lakers game on Dec. 19, 2019. They’re surrounded by an angel’s wings, and the statue includes a plaque bearing a Kobe Bryant quote about his daughter.
“Gianna is a beast,” the quote reads. “She’s better than I was at her age. She’s got it. Girls are amazing. I would have five more girls if I could. I’m a girl dad.”
The plaque also calls Kobe the “most valuable girl dad.”
In a release announcing the statue, Vanessa Bryant noted that her late husband supported women’s sports because he realized Gianna could not achieve the same things as her father simply because of her gender.
That led Kobe to publicly support the WNBA and mentor female basketball players, including Gianna.
“Kobe was the ultimate Girl Dad and Gigi was the ultimate Daddy’s girl,” Vanessa said.
Kobe, Gianna and seven other people perished in a January 26, 2020, helicopter crash in Calabasas. The group was on their way to a basketball game at the Mamba Sports Academy in nearby Thousand Oaks when the pilot crashed into a hillside shortly before 10 a.m.
In the years since his death, Kobe’s family and the Lakers have worked to memorialize the superstar outside of the arena alongside other Laker greats like Shaquille O’Neal, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Jerry West.