Kobe Bryant: Killed in Helicopter crash (update: NTSB prelim. report)

[Doc Brown]

2 hours ago, Golden Goat said:

 

If you asked Shaq who the greatest Laker was, he'd say Shaq. That's the main reason I always liked Kobe.

I was glad to see Kobe win two championships without Shaq.

[Virgil]

7 minutes ago, Chef Jim said:

Well I will say Kobe had a lot to do with my giving up on the NBA. Yes he was one of the best but a not sure a more selfish ball hog ever played the game.  The fued between him and Shaq was the nail in my NBA fan coffin. 

It’s interesting to me how having kids changed my perspective.  I was never a fan of him as a player for the reasons you said. I also thought he held the franchise hostage his last few years by not walking away, knowing they also wouldn’t release him.  
 

The scandal, I’ll never know what happened.  I know that she went to his hotel room willingly at an inappropriate hour and after that, who knows.  
 

But all I can think about today are what those last moments were like for him and his daughter.  To be completely helpless around the person you swear to protect.  His attention, and support, of his children has grown tremendously since his retirement and is well documented.  
 

I also think about the wife and mother receiving that phone call.  
 

For those reasons, I can only think of the man as he was when he died. The rest, in this moment, is irrelevant and it’s a tragedy. 
 

Any focus on the flaws in his life is more about that person needing a soapbox to be heard on.  Think about those things if you’d like, but it doesn’t need to be said right now.  You are making it about yourself if you do. 

Edited January 27, 2020 by Virgil

[Hapless Bills Fan]

3 hours ago, TH3 said:

Point is....he was never held “accountable”.....except for the check he wrote....

 

I think a general discussion of the way our justice system works is more appropriate for PPP, but the DA decides whether or not to pursue a criminal case and hold someone accountable.....and if they decide not to pursue the case, that's how it goes.

 

The same mechanism holds true in a situation where the alleged perpetrator is unjustly accused, is justly accused but there is insufficient evidence, and is accused with sufficient evidence but "pays off" or intimidates the witness.....so we as the general public can form our own opinions but that's all they are

 

 

[Buffalo716]

8 minutes ago, Chef Jim said:

Well I will say Kobe had a lot to do with my giving up on the NBA. Yes he was one of the best but a not sure a more selfish ball hog ever played the game.  The fued between him and Shaq was the nail in my NBA fan coffin. 

That selfish ball hog averaged almost 5 assists per game over 20years

 

Some years with 6+

[Augie]

14 minutes ago, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

I think a general discussion of the way our justice system works is more appropriate for PPP, but the DA decides whether or not to pursue a criminal case and hold someone accountable.....and if they decide not to pursue the case, that's how it goes.

 

The same mechanism holds true in a situation where the alleged perpetrator is unjustly accused, is justly accused but there is insufficient evidence, and is accused with sufficient evidence but "pays off" or intimidates the witness.....so we as the general public can form our own opinions but that's all they are

 

 

 

Today is the day he is held accountable. We all face this day eventually.  

[Chef Jim]

5 minutes ago, Buffalo716 said:

That selfish ball hog averaged almost 5 assists per game over 20years

 

Some years with 6+

Magic averaged over 11 per game and was a consummate team player.  Kobe doesn’t even break the top 50 all time I assists. Living in SoCal I saw Kobe play a lot. He was a ball hog and it really turned me off the game.  Don’t get me wrong he was one of the best to play the game it just wasn’t my style. 

[Buffalo716]

7 minutes ago, Chef Jim said:

Magic averaged over 11 per game and was a consummate team player.  Kobe doesn’t even break the top 50 all time I assists. Living in SoCal I saw Kobe play a lot. He was a ball hog and it really turned me off the game.  Don’t get me wrong he was one of the best to play the game it just wasn’t my style. 

Magic Johnson was a point guard who's job it is to distribute..

 

Kobe Bryant is a shooting guard who's job was to score

 

Completely different positions with different jobs

[Chef Jim]

7 minutes ago, Buffalo716 said:

Magic Johnson was a point guard who's job it is to distribute..

 

Kobe Bryant is a shooting guard who's job was to score

 

Completely different positions with different jobs

Point taken. It was also a different era when, in my opinion, the NBA was much more fun to watch. 

[GoBills808]

1 hour ago, sherpa said:

 

The actual term is "autorotation."

 

Its what helo folks do to minimize crashes by attempting to minimize the sink rate during an engine failure.

During normal flight, air is pulled down from above.

If the main rotor system is not being powered, an autorotation is done and the air goes up through the rotor.

 

Not a helicopter fan. Way too many moving parts.

An aircraft whose wings travel faster than its fuselage is inherently unsafe

[Hapless Bills Fan]

49 minutes ago, Augie said:

Today is the day he is held accountable. We all face this day eventually.  

 

If so, 'twill not be by us

[Hapless Bills Fan]

1 hour ago, LSHMEAB said:

False accusations like the one leveled at Bryant should have MUCH stiffer penalties. It's really difficult to disprove a rape allegation, but this one came pretty close.

 

We don't know it was a false accusation.  We don't know it was true.  It was never tried as a criminal matter.  The civil case was settled.

 

In that situation, it's just as off base (in my view) to go around calling the guy a "rapist" who was "never held accountable" as it is to characterize the alleged victim as making a false accusation.  We simply don't know, either way.

 

The man and one of his children are dead, it just seems in poor taste to me to focus on that one incident in his life, whatever one's opinion.

 

 

1 hour ago, DrDawkinstein said:

 

As my Airforce buddies say when talking about why they never want to fly in helicopters:

 

"Planes use physics to work with the air so the air wants to keep them afloat. Whereas helicopters just beat the air into submission."

 

Haha yah fixed wing and heli pilots LoooooOOooooove to talk trash about each other.

 

Truth though!

[Kirby Jackson]

Y’all, I’m really struggling with this. Kobe was never my guy but the tragic nature of it all has me in a weird place. I cried today (keep in mind I cry a lot). I just can’t wrap my head around it and for an empathetic, analytical person that’s really hard. I’m not capable of shrugging my shoulders and saying, “such is life.” Today is horrible

[Teddy KGB]

2 minutes ago, Kirby Jackson said:

Y’all, I’m really struggling with this. Kobe was never my guy but the tragic nature of it all has me in a weird place. I cried today (keep in mind I cry a lot). I just can’t wrap my head around it and for an empathetic, analytical person that’s really hard. I’m not capable of shrugging my shoulders and saying, “such is life.” Today is horrible

Same.    Listening to Ramona Shelburne cry and talk about his career on ESPNradio today brought a mild weep to me all day long.  

[YoloinOhio]

14 minutes ago, Kirby Jackson said:

Y’all, I’m really struggling with this. Kobe was never my guy but the tragic nature of it all has me in a weird place. I cried today (keep in mind I cry a lot). I just can’t wrap my head around it and for an empathetic, analytical person that’s really hard. I’m not capable of shrugging my shoulders and saying, “such is life.” Today is horrible

There are so many angles to it that just wreck me. Seeing the pictures of his young daughter looking so happy with him at all those basketball games, trying to follow in his footsteps. He was so proud to coach her team. He and his wife got engaged when she was 18 and been together all this time. I know they had their issues through the years , but they seemed to  be in a good place and the family looked so happy. Now left to raise a newborn and the two other girls after losing her husband and daughter. Devastating.  Money can’t fix everything. 

Edited January 27, 2020 by YoloinOhio

[LSHMEAB]

22 minutes ago, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

We don't know it was a false accusation.  We don't know it was true.  It was never tried as a criminal matter.  The civil case was settled.

 

In that situation, it's just as off base (in my view) to go around calling the guy a "rapist" who was "never held accountable" as it is to characterize the alleged victim as making a false accusation.  We simply don't know, either way.

We don't know. That much is true. But there is a TREMENDOUS amount of evidence that the allegation was false. I FULLY believe it was false and beyond initial evidence, subsequent behavior and occurrences have only strengthened my PERSONAL belief.

 

I wasn't there, so I'll never know anything with certainty just as not a single person can claim to KNOW that OJ Simpson murdered Goldman/Brown.

[Nelius]

Yeah, this is a tough one. It's been weighing on me heavily all day. While I've been hanging with my daughter especially, which I'm incredibly thankful for on one hand, but it's really hard not to dwell on the whole scenario. And Kobe was an absolute legend. I'm kind of stunned by some of the responses in this thread, not even considering the weird political ones (the entire 24/7 cable news model has been trash since post 9/11 regardless of your political lean btw). He's a top-5 all time lock. Ball hog and only known in California? The entire world is mourning. Everybody knows who Kobe is.

[Process]

21 minutes ago, Kirby Jackson said:

Y’all, I’m really struggling with this. Kobe was never my guy but the tragic nature of it all has me in a weird place. I cried today (keep in mind I cry a lot). I just can’t wrap my head around it and for an empathetic, analytical person that’s really hard. I’m not capable of shrugging my shoulders and saying, “such is life.” Today is horrible

It is a pretty surreal and wierd feeling. I woke up this morning and watched a clip of LeBron talking for five minutes last night about what it meant to pass him in points and what Kobe meant to him. A couple hours later start seeing tweets that he's dead. 

[SDS]

4 minutes ago, Nelius said:

Yeah, this is a tough one. It's been weighing on me heavily all day. While I've been hanging with my daughter especially, which I'm incredibly thankful for on one hand, but it's really hard not to dwell on the whole scenario. And Kobe was an absolute legend. I'm kind of stunned by some of the responses in this thread, not even considering the weird political ones (the entire 24/7 cable news model has been trash since post 9/11 regardless of your political lean btw). He's a top-5 all time lock. Ball hog and only known in California? The entire world is mourning. Everybody knows who Kobe is.

The *entire world* is not mourning. This is exactly what I just posted about - you are projecting your feelings on to everyone else. Believe it or not, the vast vast vast majority of the world doesn’t give a ***** about the NBA. 

[GoBills808]

2 minutes ago, SDS said:

The *entire world* is not mourning. This is exactly what I just posted about - you are projecting your feelings on to everyone else. Believe it or not, the vast vast vast majority of the world doesn’t give a ***** about the NBA. 

The entire sports world then, which is very much a global community.

[SDS]

1 minute ago, GoBills808 said:

The entire sports world then, which is very much a global community.

perhaps I’m a cynic, but I find the athlete responses are more out of perceived obligation than out of true emotion. 
 

regardless, 9 people died in that crash.