Five-time NBA champion Kobe Bryant to present Decade Award to Justin Timberlake. Grammy Award-Winning Singer/Producer NE-YO set to deliver a timely and powerful performance not to be missed. WWE® Superstar John Cena and Victoria Justice host.TEEN CHOICE 2016 airs live on Sunday, July 31, on FOX. About Teen Choice 2016: Hosted by WWE® Superstar John Cena and Victoria Justice (star of FOX's upcoming "THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW: Let's Do the Time Warp Again"), TEEN CHOICE 2016 will honor the year's iconic stars from the best films, most-loved TV shows, fiercest music and the top moments in fashion, digital and comedy with coveted TEEN CHOICE Surfboard awards. Five-time NBA champion Kobe Bryant will present the Decade Award to global superstar Justin Timberlake, four-time TEEN CHOICE 2016 nominee Charlie Puth will perform his hit single, "We Don't Talk Anymore," and EMPIRE's Serayah will perform. Kobe Bryant, Jessica Alba, Jennifer Garner, Lea Michele, Sarah Hyland, NE-YO, Chris Evans, Daisy Ridley, Shay Mitchell and Ashley Benson are among the celebrities scheduled to appear.
MANILA, Philippines – Global apparel brand Nike is set to hand out 24 "Golden Nike Basketballs" in barangay basketball courts in Manila this week, with each one giving the recipient a chance to watch the main event of the Mamba Mentality tour.
The Mamba Mentality tour will be headlined by NBA and Los Angeles Lakers legend Kobe Bryant, who's making another visit to Manila this weekend courtesy of Nike.
The main event, Mamba Mentality Night, will be held at the Smart Araneta Coliseum on Saturday, June 25.
Bryant, nicknamed "The Black Mamba" for most of his storied NBA career, will also hold a press conference in Shangri-la Hotel at The Fort on Saturday.
The 5-time NBA champion is also expected to hold a "Kobe Academy" basketball camp on Sunday, June 26, where selected young basketball players will get to train with Bryant.
According to Nike, "young ballers" can earn the golden basketballs by winning challenges against players of the Nike Rise program. Winning a golden basketball earns them a premium ticket to the event at The Big Dome in Quezon City.
Nike will randomly go to barangay courts around Metro Manila where, according to the company, "the spirit of basketball is strong." They'll challenge young basketball players to "display their Mamba Mentality" for the chance to get rewarded with a golden basketball.
Bryant, who's also a former NBA MVP, played all 20 seasons of his NBA career with the Los Angeles Lakers. The 37-year-old's final game took place in April against the Utah Jazz when he scored 60 points and helped deliver a win for his team. – Rappler.com
Kobe Bryant's final game in the NBA was something to remember. His 60 freaking points. The tributes. Nearly every player in the NBA losing their mind, just like every other fan. The Lakers even added a No. 8 and an No. 24 to the court for his final game as one of the many ways to honor him. After the game, Kobe signed the floor pieces, of course. What would one pay for a piece of that floor? A small $179,100.
Hope whoever bought this installs it as the floor of their kitchen or living room for maximum exposure. Just put some treatment on the autographed part before you do and let the good times roll.
When retiring Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant bids the NBA farewell Wednesday, chances are more people will see him in a new commercial for Apple TV than the final game itself. Which is a good thing for this basketball legend, who shrewdly uses the spot to satirize his own prickly persona.
But while Bryant comes off great in these commercials, maybe the same can’t be said about Apple TV.
Bryant’s performance opposite Michael B. Jordan is the second celebrity-centric commercial Apple has furnished in support of the upgraded version of the living-room device unveiled last September. “Game of Thrones” star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau and “Community” star Alison Brie are featured in the first one.
Both ads use the same, very Hollywood-ish premise, focusing the action entirely inside a trailer on set at some unspecified fictional production being discussed by each twosome. The Apple TV is being used by the actors in a way that allows them to showcase the device’s ability to use remote-controlled voice command to easily navigate their TV experience.
In the Bryant-Jordan spot, “Father Time,” Jordan talks to Bryant about playing the basketball star in a biopic only to discover they have very different conceptions of his role. While Bryant verbally instructs his Apple TV via its remote to fire up its NBA app to show Jordan footage of himself in his basketball prime, Jordan is so obsessed with portraying the athlete as “old Kobe” that he uses Apple TV to stream “Benjamin Button,” cuing up a specific frame of the film in which the title character looks incredibly old.
Bryant is so offended that he petulantly dismisses Jordan. “Get out of my trailer,” he sniffs.
For “The Kiss” with Brie and Coster-Waldau, they use Apple TV to easily call up scenes of the “Thrones” hunk’s previous work to help them prepare for a romantic scene they’ll be doing together. Again, the focus is on voice control. Coster-Waldau demonstrates Apple TV’s Apple Music feature by calling up a sultry R&B song he sings along to intended to get Brie “in the mood,” which hilariously has the opposite effect.
Both commercials are amusing, but will they accomplish what Apple wants for this device? Keep in mind the company’s goal isn’t as simple as just selling as many units as possible; this is a critical juncture in the life cycle of the product because Apple needs to establish Apple TV’s brand identity.
Bringing in cool celebrities and athletes gives Apple TV the kind of upmarket cool the company wants to project for all of its products. But there’s an additional challenge here these spots could be faulted for falling short on: delivering the wow factor on the device’s functionality.
Apple needs to woo consumers who already have plenty of options when it comes to devices that stream content in their living room, whether that’s rival devices that also have voice-command features like Roku, or the many different smart TVs in the marketplace. If all Apple TV has to sell itself right now is pointing out that consumers will have the ability to speak into a remote control and fast-forward to a particular time, that’s not really much to brag about–nor pay more for than the other options.
Apple TV is still likely to add many more features and apps in the coming months that could significantly add to its capabilities, so going out in the market now when people by and large don’t really have a handle on what the device does and branding it as “the voice-remote” device when that’s not much of a differentiating factor from the competition is not the smartest move Apple could be making with its marketing.
Maybe a company as gargantuan as Apple doesn’t have to sweat an ad or two. But as someone who mastered the fine art of image maintenance, Bryant is just the person who could have warned Apple that perception is everything.
If you missed out on the Nike Kobe 1 through 10, you're in luck.
Kobe Bryant has been having what is probably the ideal finale season, at least in terms of the respect he’s getting. His on-court play hasn’t been anything to write home about, but he’s exhibited poise as every team pays homage to the legendary Los Angeles Laker, most recently getting a personal video tribute from his former teammate Pau Gasol during a trip to Chicago. Kobe has also been giving out his sneakers left and right to younger players, but now Nike wants to give fans a chance to get in on the Kobe Bryant Farewell Tour™.
Nike’s Kobe sneaker line has been extremely successful for the brand, and to commemorate the shoe’s namesake, they’re going to release a retro of every Nike Kobe sneaker that’s released since the line’s inception. Nike has been listening to fans, because they’re also including the Nike Zoom Huarache 2k4, not part of the signature sneaker line, but widely considered to be his first “unofficial” signature sneaker.
Called the “Fade to Black” collection, each sneaker will be priced at $200. The colors look like they will start off pure white with the Nike Zoom Huarache 2k4 and then will slowly transition to darker colors until the Kobe 11, which will be all black. It’s a great motif. Peep the sneaker list below with (as of now rumored) release dates.
WE all assume that the MJ who had the biggest influence on Kobe Bryant was Michael Jordan. But the Black Mamba revealed that Michael Jackson also helped shape him into the legend he would become.
On “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel”, Kobe revealed that the King of Pop reached out to him when he was still an 18-year-old rookie. Jackson let him know to just be himself (via Real Sports press release):
KOBE BRYANT: “Gold’s Gym in ‘98. Liftin’ weights and I get a phone call and it’s Michael Jackson on the other line. And kinda, ‘What the hell is going on?’ Somebody’s playing a practical joke.
ANDREA KREMER: “Michael Jackson calling you at the age of 18?”
KOBE BRYANT: “Age of 18. He’s a big basketball fan. I was starting to get flack for being an introvert and being so serious all the time about the game. And he wanted to call and give me encouragement and say, ‘Don’t change for them. You have to stay focused. If you wanna be one of the all-time greats you have to study the all-time greats. You have to be obsessive about what you do and how you do it.’ And the summertime, I would just disappear. I’d be studying, I’d be researching, I’d be figuring out a way.”
ANDREA KREMER: “Studying, researching what?”
KOBE BRYANT: “The game. Chicago won another championship. How? Why? How do we get to that level?”
Kobe’s focus has become legendary — almost maniacal — and it’s part of the reason the man will walk away with five championship rings.
Thứ Sáu, 4 tháng 12, 2015
Steph Curry, Kobe Bryant, Neymar and Lionel Messi may each have legions of fans, but the superstars are big fans of each other, too. That all-star fandom was particularly evident this week when the group couldn’t stop complimenting each other on TV and social media.
The reason Bryant got a lot of love is obvious. After announcing his retirement on Sunday in a poem reminiscent of Michael Jordan’s famous retirement letter to basketball, athletes from all over thanked him for his contribution to the sport. Messi’s was one of the most high profile, and not only because he put it on Instagram where he has more than 30 million followers from around the world. It was also because he credited Bryant with getting him to love basketball.
Bryant on retirement: ‘There’s so much beauty in the pain of this thing’
Speaking of Messi’s 30 million Instagram followers, Steph Curry had some compliments to dole out to the 28-year-old Argentine about that popularity on Thursday. In a short video, he also offered tickets to a game for Messi and held up an autographed jersey with the number 30 on it.
Curry’s hair looks nice, doesn’t it? Neymar sure thinks so! On Wednesday, he gushed over the Golden State Warriors star’s look and said his current hairstyle is modeled after the 27-year-old’s.
Neymar’s appearance on FIFA Ballon d’Or short list is a big step for soccer
“I hadn’t used that hairstyle since 2009,” Neymar told Brazil’s Globo (via CBS Sports). “Stephen Curry style.”
(Albert Gea/Reuters)
Eh, close enough. Much closer than the nearly 6,000 miles of land and ocean that separates Spain from California. Despite the distance, though, this chumminess between Spanish soccer and West Coast basketball has been going on for years. Need proof? Well then we might as well complete the circle and have Kobe show us. That’s Neymar in the lower left. And who can forget this ad from 2013?
“I have been following the side for 10 years,” Bryant said this summer when Barcelona traveled to Los Angeles for an exhibition game, revealed during a meeting with the players at the StubHub Center in Los Angeles. “I love watching Messi, [Andres] Iniesta and the rest of the squad.”
Bryant said he hasn’t yet had a chance to watch Barca at their hometown stadium Camp Nou, but says it’s one of his lifelong dreams. Seems worthy of a post-retirement trip, right?
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