The late Los Angeles Lakers shooting guard Kobe Bryant is being celebrated around the world Saturday for the annual “Kobe Bryant Day” festivities. Aug. 24 commemorates Bryant’s two now-retired jersey numbers with the Lakers. Bryant wore No. 8 until 2006, in honor of his favorite player to watch growing up in Italy, his future head coach Mike D’Antoni. Then he switched to No. 24, in an effort to express his “growth,” he said (it was also his jersey number at Lower Merion High School), though Kevin Garnett said he wore it to show that, in his mind, he was better than Chicago Bulls Hall of Fame shooting guard Michael Jordan.. It also comes a day after Bryant’s birthday. He tragically died in a helicopter crash in January 2020 at the age of 41. The 18-time All-Star would have turned 46 this year.
Today, Chicago, home of the team once led by Bryant’s friend, mentor and rival Jordan, is honoring Bryant in the best way possible: with a few basketball games.
Starting at 12 p.m. PT/2 p.m. CT Saturday, the courts at Jackson Park on the Windy City’s South Side will commemorate Bryants’ birthday with a tournament and skills competition, according to Maxwell Evans of Block Chicago. Skill-based youth basketball clinics will kick off the festivities from 12 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. PT and 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. CT. A court-cutting ceremony will follow. Then, competition will begin with a four-hour single-elimination basketball tournament, a 3-point shootout at 6 p.m. PT and 8 p.m. CT and a dunk contest at 7 p.m. PT and 9 p.m. CT. $300 will be awarded to the winners of the 3-point shootout and dunks.
Bryant reportedly tried to join Chicago via trade in 2007, frustrated that he had been saddled with years of post-Shaquille O’Neal mediocrity in Los Angeles. The Bulls were a fun, annoying, defensive-minded team in the Eastern Conference at the time, led by plucky young players like Luol Deng, Kirk Hinrich and Andres Nocioni, as well as an aging Ben Wallace and sharpshooter Ben Gordon. Once it became clear that the Lakers were serious about getting Deng—then the Bulls’ best player and a potential two-time All-Star—in any deal, Bryant lost interest. Ironically, the Lakers eventually signed Deng the summer after Bryant retired, to a four-year, $72 million contract that quickly soured, with the 6-foot-10 forward eventually agreeing to a $7.5 million buyout.
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