Heart-felt, emotional moments shared during two-and-a-half hour celebration of life.
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00:00 Chris Maddox here with Melissa Rowland, SI.com, and we're outside the Staples Center, Melissa,
00:04 where moments ago you're still hearing the chants of Kobe, Kobe, a completely packed
00:10 Staples Center for the Kobe Bryant and Gianna Bryant Memorial.
00:14 So much to talk about.
00:15 What was your takeaway from the atmosphere of this event?
00:17 The atmosphere was incredible.
00:18 I know 90,000 fans tried to come today.
00:21 Only 19,000 were given the ability to come, but it was incredible.
00:26 You can hear right now in the background, perhaps, people are still chanting Kobe Bryant
00:30 at this exact moment.
00:31 I mean, it was remarkable.
00:33 Just a lot of basketball luminaries there.
00:35 You saw players from other teams there.
00:37 I saw Russell Westbrook there, James Harden there, several members of the Golden State
00:42 Warriors.
00:43 So everybody really showed out for this event.
00:45 And this was our first real chance to see Vanessa Bryant out in public and speaking
00:51 for the first time about the loss of her husband and daughter.
00:54 What was your takeaway from a very emotional speech by Vanessa Bryant?
00:58 It was really incredible to hear her speak.
01:00 I don't know if I've ever heard her speak publicly before or heard her speak in any
01:03 interviews before.
01:04 And she was given an extremely transparent, intimate view into who Kobe was as a person,
01:10 as a father, as a husband.
01:13 I couldn't see him as a celebrity, nor just an incredible basketball player.
01:18 He was my sweet husband and the beautiful father of our children.
01:22 He was mine.
01:24 He was my everything.
01:26 She actually recalled a story about how he gifted her the actual notebook and the dress
01:31 that Rachel McAdams wore from the notebook.
01:34 He was romantic.
01:35 We had hoped to grow old together like the movie.
01:39 We really had an amazing love story.
01:42 We loved each other with our whole beings.
01:44 Two perfectly imperfect people making a beautiful family and raising our sweet and amazing girls.
01:52 She talked about the deep love that Gianna and Kobe shared.
01:56 It was so deep that she made a comment that really stuck with me.
02:00 It was essentially something along the lines of, "They couldn't have been in this world
02:05 without each other."
02:06 God knew they couldn't be on this earth without each other.
02:14 He had to bring them home to heaven together.
02:19 Just listening to Vanessa talk and a little bit later on, Gino Auriemma, just reminded
02:23 me of not just the impact that Kobe had on women's basketball in his short time post-playing,
02:28 but of just what the world lost in Gianna, of the type of player she was inevitably going
02:33 to become.
02:34 Just going to top-level women's games, already having the scholarship offer from UConn, her
02:40 mom talking about her being maybe the best player eventually in the WNBA.
02:44 That was pretty powerful and resonated with me.
02:46 Number 24, number 8, and number 2, those are basketball numbers.
02:58 Those are numbers in the past.
03:00 Those are numbers that we're not going to get back.
03:05 What we do have is today how many numbers of kids like Gianna have been inspired to
03:16 do more, to work harder, to strive for more.
03:22 The numbers we also don't have is how many numbers of kids in the future, how many women
03:29 are going to be inspired by Gigi's life.
03:34 This was an event that did have some levity though.
03:36 There were some fun moments as people tried to remember Kobe.
03:40 It was billed as a celebration, so you were bound to have those moments.
03:43 What was your favorite moment from the nearly two hours of this event?
03:48 My favorite fun moment was when Shaq was talking about how Kobe wouldn't pass.
03:53 At one point he had to remind him, "Kobe, there's no I in team."
03:57 Kobe's response was, "Yeah, man, but there's an M and there's an E."
04:00 The guys were complaining, "Shaq, Kobe's not passing the ball."
04:04 I said, "I'll talk to him."
04:06 I said, "Kobe, there's no I in team."
04:11 Kobe said, "I know, but there's an M-E in that motherf*****."
04:17 There was moments of levity throughout the whole thing.
04:19 Jimmy Kimmel also was really funny.
04:21 After Alicia Keys played a rendition of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, Jimmy Kimmel took the stage
04:27 and joked that Kobe's up in heaven right now, thinking of how he's going to top that version.
04:31 I loved what Michael Jordan said when he was up there.
04:35 There's not a lot really known about the Michael and Kobe relationship.
04:40 Michael really opened up about their big brother, little brother relationship, called him one
04:44 of his best friends, got really emotional up there.
04:47 In the middle of that crying, and people that are on the internet know when Michael Jordan
04:51 cries it becomes something, Jordan kind of steered right into it.
04:54 Maybe it surprised people that Kobe and I were very close friends, but we were very
05:01 close friends.
05:02 Kobe was my dear friend.
05:06 He was like a little brother.
05:09 Now he's got me, I'll have to look at another crying meme for the next ...
05:20 So there were some emotional moments and certainly some fun moments there as well, but a tremendous,
05:26 tremendous show, or at least the crowd here at the Staples Center who are still filing
05:30 around and still wanting to celebrate the life and time of Kobe Bryant.
05:34 I will always remember this day for the rest of my life.
05:37 I'm never going to forget him.
05:38 He was such a great man.
05:40 I cried so many times.
05:42 I was just crying a minute ago.
05:43 I think today for me this was a good way to honor him and just remember him.
05:51 Kobe!
05:52 Kobe!
05:53 Kobe!
05:54 Kobe!
05:55 Kobe!
05:56 Kobe!
05:57 Kobe!