Vanessa Bryant has mourned the "senseless" death of her husband Kobe Bryant on his retirement anniversary.
Vanessa and Kobe Bryant
The late NBA star would have marked four years of retirement on Monday (13.04.20), but sadly lost his life at the age of 41 in January, when he and his 13-year-old daughter Gianna were involved in a helicopter crash which killed seven others.
And to mark the anniversary of Kobe's last basketball game with the Los Angeles Lakers, his wife Vanessa - who had Gianna, as well as Natalia, 17, Bianka, three, and Capri, nine months, with Kobe - took to Instagram to mourn his tragic death.
She wrote: "Mamba Day
"My husband worked his a** off for 20 years. Gave it his all. All he wanted was to spend time with our girls and me to make up for lost time. He wanted to be there for every single milestone and special moment in our girls lives. He only got to enjoy 3 years and 9 months of retirement. We had 2 more daughters, he won an Oscar, he opened Granity studios, he became a 5x best selling author and coached Gianna's basketball team in that time. She worked hard and gave her all 7 days a week just like her daddy. I wish I could back to that morning, every day. I wish they had a normal local game on 1/26. Life truly isn't fair. This is just senseless. (sic)"
The tribute comes just one week after Vanessa revealed she was "incredibly proud" following the announcement that Kobe will be posthumously inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame.
She said: "It's an incredible accomplishment and honour and we're extremely proud of him. Obviously we wish that he was here with us to celebrate but it's definitely the peak of his NBA career. Every accomplishment that he had as an athlete was a stepping stone to be here. We're incredibly proud of him. There's some solace in knowing that he was probably going to be a part of the 2020 Hall of Fame class."
Since retiring from professional basketball in 2016, this year marks Kobe's first year of eligibility for the Hall of Fame.
Kobe spent his entire professional 20-year career with the Lakers, and is a five-time NBA champion, two-time NBA Finals MVP and 18-time All-Star, league MVP.
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