Kobe Bryant’s warm-up shirt sold for $277,200 at auction

By Can Erozden

ANKARA (AA) - A basketball fan on Wednesday bought former NBA and Los Angeles Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant’s warm-up shirt for over $275,000 at an auction.

"Kobe Bryant’s Los Angeles Lakers shooting shirt from his legendary 2006 81-point game achieves $277,200. The shirt was acquired by David Kohler, owner of the largest known private collection of Lakers memorabilia Lakers Shrine and President of SCP Auctions," UK’s famous auction house Sotheby’s said on Twitter.

Sotheby’s said on its website that Kohler also got Kobe's "One-of-One" 81 Point NFT (non-fungible tokens) that was designed by Karvin Cheung.

A five-time NBA champion, Bryant, who died in a 2020 helicopter crash, scored 81 points against the Toronto Raptors in a 2006 game to make history.

This is still the second greatest scoring performance in a single NBA game after Wilt Chamberlain had tallied 100 points against the New York Knicks in 1962.

Called the Black Mamba, Bryant was a Lakers loyal as he spent his entire career with the same franchise.

The 18-time NBA All-Star won five NBA titles with the Lakers in 2000, 2001, 2002, 2009, 2010.

Separately, Bryant helped the US national team win two Olympic gold medals in Beijing 2008 and London 2012, and retired from the game in 2016.

He died in a helicopter crash along with his daughter Gianna on Jan. 26, 2020.

Bryant was 41.