Kobe Bryant took part in an investment round in 2015 that saw him contribute his money towards a $15 million investment in ‘The Players’ Tribune’.
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Kobe Bryant may have earned well over $300 million through mere career earnings with the Los Angeles Lakers but this didn’t stop him from expanding his horizons and becoming one of the league’s most successful player off the court as well.
Bryant founded ‘Bryant and Stibel’ and used a lump-sum of around $100 million to invest in a variety of companies and businesses. Perhaps the most fruitful investment came from their $6 million one in BodyArmor that would be valued at $200 million present day.
Aside from making profits through investments, Kobe Bryant has also donated quite a bit of his money for charitable reasons such as $1 million to the Call of Duty Endowment while also founding ‘The Kobe and Vanessa Bryant Family Foundation.
Kobe Bryant completed a $15 million investment in ‘The Players’ Tribune’.
Often times, players’ views on certain topics asked to them by the media get misconstrued, leading a an egregious amount of drama that could’ve been avoided. Yankees legend, Derek Jeter, wanted players to be able to control the narrative as it’s their lives that are being talked about.
Jeter started ‘The Players’ Tribune’ for athletes to be able to tell their own stories at their own time and talk about what they wanted to talk about. Kobe Bryant saw great potential in this (in hindsight, he was absolutely correct), and decided to invest in the company in 2015 by contributing a bit of wealth to a total $15 million investment.
“There are three areas of interest: media, technology, and storytelling,” said Kobe when asked why he invested in the company. “’The Players’ Tribune’ is the perfect intersection of those personal passions. They disrupted the status quo by giving a platform to athletes. I believe we are at the start of a revolution when it comes to people owning their stories and using them to build their businesses.”
The Hall-of-Famer couldn’t be more right as fast-forward to present current and former athletes like Draymond Green, Kevin Durant, and JJ Redick, just to name a few, have begun the age of new media where they get to control the narrative.
