Kobe Bryant is no longer an obsessive basketball player after retiring in 2016. He is now an obsessive businessman, hellbent on taking over the world of sports drinks and media. As Bryant tells it, he didn’t make this transition a year ago, though.
In a recent profile on his ventures into the business world, Bryant told ESPN’s Darren Rovell he’s long been as crazy about his business ventures as he was about basketball, but people simply didn’t believe him.
“I got tired of telling people I loved business as much as I did basketball because people would look at me like I had three heads,” Bryant said. “But I do.”
The best example Bryant gave of how involved he was on the business side of things with his partnerships he had with brands as a player was a 2009 Vitamin Water ad starring Dwight Howard that ran during the NBA Finals when the Magic and the Lakers played.
Where’d the idea for that spot come from? “I wrote that sh*t,” Bryant said.
Yes, Bryant apparently secretly wrote that spot and says he was far more involved with the ad firm Zambezi, which created the spot, than people knew. I love the idea of Kobe staying up late trying to put together a commercial script for an ad campaign that has nothing to do with him.
It’s a good thing Bryant was writing Dwight’s ads before he got to L.A. and not after, because they probably would’ve had a very different tone.
(h/t The Score)
