Kobe Bryant Summary | Britannica

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Kobe Bryant, (born Aug. 23, 1978, Philadelphia, Pa., U.S.—died Jan. 26, 2020, Calabasas, Calif.), U.S. basketball player. Bryant, whose father also played professional basketball, entered the NBA draft straight from high school. He was picked by the Charlotte Hornets in 1996 but was soon traded to the Los Angeles Lakers. When the 1996–97 season opened, he was the second youngest NBA player in history. Bryant, a shooting guard, helped the Lakers win five championships (2000–02; 2009–10). In 2008 he was named the league’s Most Valuable Player. He retired following the 2015–16 NBA season. In addition to his professional accomplishments, Bryant was a member of the Olympic gold medal-winning U.S. men’s basketball teams in 2008 and 2012. In 2015 he wrote the poem “Dear Basketball,” which served as the basis for a short film (2017) that he narrated. The work won an Academy Award for best animated short film. In 2020 Bryant died in a helicopter crash.

Olympic Games Summary Olympic Games, athletic festival that originated in ancient Greece and was revived in the late 19th century. Before the 1970s the Games were officially limited to competitors with amateur status, but in the 1980s many events were opened to professional athletes. Currently, the Games are open to basketball Summary Basketball, game played between two teams, typically of five players each, on a rectangular court. Each team tries to score by shooting, laying up, or dunking the ball through the opponent’s goal, an elevated horizontal hoop and net called a basket. The only major sport strictly of U.S. origin,