UFC 247’s pay-per-view broadcast began with a short video tribute to the late Kobe Bryant. The 41-year-old retired NBA star who went by the nickname of “The Black Mamba” was killed in a helicopter crash in late January, along with his daughter Gianna and seven others.
To commemorate the nine lives that perished on that fateful January 26th morning in Calabasas, California, the UFC also offered a nine-second moment of silence.
Bryant was an investor in the UFC and held an ownership stake in the company’s energy drink partner, BodyArmor. According to Dana White, Kobe received his share from the UFC days before the accident.
“Kobe got a distribution from the UFC the Wednesday before the incident,” White told TMZ Sports. “And he was so pumped up and he was so excited and he said what everybody always says, ‘I wish I invested more.’
“He was a great dude, he was a part of this company,” White continued. “Kobe Bryant was a good guy in every way that you could possibly be a good guy.”
Bryant was a five-time NBA champion with the Los Angeles Lakers, an 18-time NBA All-Star and won the Most Valuable Player award in 2008. He retired in 2016 after a 20-year career and moved on to other ventures outside of the game. In 2018, he won an Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film for his 2017 film Dear Basketball.