By Marc Anthony Costanza

This past Sunday night, Hollywood got dolled up to celebrate the 90th edition of the Academy Awards. Typical of any other year or award show, the movies, actors and actresses you expected to win, won. However, a moment of surprise that has captured a lot of people’s attention is Kobe Bryant’s “Dear Basketball” win for Best Animated Short.

Based on a poem Bryant wrote in 2015 in the wake of announcing his impending retirement from basketball, the animated short lays out the former Laker’s passion and love for the game. Additionally, he explains that even though his heart and mind are still fully able to continue playing, the physical pains from a long career and aging will not allow his body to do it.

If you’re a sports fan, a person who can appreciate the dedication athletes put towards their craft or even just someone looking for some motivation, then I believe “Dear Basketball” would be an enjoyable experience for you. The poem and animated short profess a message applicable to areas beyond just basketball.

Love and passion for things are extremely rare. These words tend to be thrown around and misused just for the sake of expression; however, they are truly significant in describing the drive one has for doing something they cherish in life. For Derek Jeter, it was baseball. For Martin Scorsese, it was film-making. For the carpenter working on the house across the street, it was the chance to work with his hands and help build beautiful homes. For Kobe, it was basketball.

The love Bryant has for basketball is pretty surreal. Just from reading the poem or watching the animated short, you know he never really wanted to stop playing. His main reason for stopping was because his body physically would not allow him to continue anymore.

Every time I think of Kobe Bryant and his desire to keep playing, I’m reminded of the scene from the movie Moneyball, where a young Billy Beane is offered a MLB contract. One of the scouts says to Beane, “We’re all told at some point and time that we can no longer play the children’s game. We just don’t know when that’s going to be. Some of us are told at 18, some of us are told at 40, but we’re all told.”

In Bryant’s career, his body is what officially told him “he can no longer play the children’s game” anymore. You know that if he could, he would still be suiting up in a Laker uniform.

Although for the future Hall of Famer, life outside of basketball hasn’t been so bad. He started his own investment company, Kobe Inc., which focuses on brands in the sports industry. Then, in 2016, with his business partner, Jeff Stibel, Bryant launched a venture capital company named Bryant-Stibel to give attention to technology, media and data. Now, he just added some more gold to his trophy case with an Oscar.

I guess Kobe is doing a little more than just shutting up and dribbling.