Home Celebrities Kanye West: Kobe Bryant “Was the Basketball Version of Me”

Kanye West: Kobe Bryant “Was the Basketball Version of Me”

by Tracy Finke

Rapper Kanye West, 42, revealed that the death of one of his best friends, Kobe Bryant, was a turning point for him and told that Kobe was the basketball version of him.

Former basketball and NBA star Kobe Bryant died at the age of 41 in January this year, along with his 13-year-old daughter, Gianna, and seven others in a helicopter crash in Calabasas.

Image source: insider.com

The rapper revealed that Kobe’s death had fallen hard for him. “He was the basketball version of me, and I was the rap version of him”, he said in an interview with GQ.

The rap icon, who lives in Calabasas with his wife Kim Kardashian, 39, and their four children recalled riding down the Las Virgines highway, where a helicopter crashed.

Image source: gq.com

“There’s one street that I drive to go from either my office or my home to the property where the domes were built. So now there’s no way for me not to be as determined as Kobe every time I drive down that street”, Kanye said.

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He continued: “It’s game time. There’s no move that we can’t make, or that we’ll wait to make. Everyone in our life is now a member of the Lakers on one of Kobe’s championship teams. The way that Kobe would say that we all have to come together and win this championship is the way I look at life now. To an infinite, other level”.

Image source: slamonline.com

“This is a game changer for me. He was the basketball version of me, and I was the rap version of him, and that’s facts! We got the commercials that prove it. No one else can say this. We came up at the same time, together”, he explained.

They were once the main actors in the Nike commercial, including the Kobe-signed sneaker commercial.

In one of the commercials, Kanye plays a villain who escapes in a helicopter, until Kobe tosses an “explosive basketball” toward a helicopter, which then ignites and crashes, and fans now comment that Kobe repeatedly predicted how he would die.

Kobe and Kanye have been friends for years. The basketball player participated in a remix of Kanye’s 2010 song “Power.”

Image source: vulture.com

When Kobe played his last game for the Lakers in 2016, Kanye was at the Staples Center to support him.

At the commemoration of the death of Kobe Bryant, Kanye was there with the entire Kardashian family, who came to support Kobe’s widow Vanessa.

Read Also: Kylie Jenner and Her Niece Flew On Kobe Bryant‘s Helicopter