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'Heartbroken' LeBron James makes first public statement on Kobe Bryant's death

'Heartbroken' LeBron James makes first public statement on Kobe Bryant's death

LeBron James has made his first public comments since the death of his fellow Los Angeles Laker, Kobe Bryant, on Sunday.

Bryant, who retired in 2016, was killed in a helicopter crash along with eight others, including his teenage daughter Gianna. The day before James had passed Bryant as the NBA’s third-highest all-time scorer. Bryant’s last public statement was a tweet in which he praised James’s scoring feat.

In an Instagram post, James said he was crying as he wrote a tribute to Bryant, who was his teammate on USA’s gold-medal winning basketball teams at the 2008 and 2012 Olympics.

“I literally just heard your voice Sunday morning before I left Philly to head back to LA,” James wrote. “Didn’t think for one bit in a million years that would be the last conversation we’d have.”

James was seen in tears after the Lakers’ plane from Philadelphia, where they had played on Saturday night, touched down in LA. He said he would attempt to emulate Bryant’s success in LA, where he had won five championships before his death. “I promise you I’ll continue your legacy man,” wrote James. “You mean so much to us all here especially #LakerNation and it’s my responsibility to put this shit on my back and keep it going!! Please give me the strength from the heavens above and watch over me!”

Related: Kobe Bryant ranked at the very top in the pantheon of US sports megastars

James also included a collection of photos of the two together in the Instagram post. The Lakers have postponed Tuesday night’s game against their cross-city rivals, the Clippers, following Bryant’s death.

Bryant was also remembered as the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs gathered for this Sunday’s Super Bowl in Miami. His close friend, Richard Sherman, is one of the 49ers’ key players, and said he hopes he can pay tribute to his friend by winning the title.

“I was really sad yesterday and sad this morning. I was really down,” Sherman said on Monday night. “I was in the dumps, and then I thought about what he would tell me. He would tell me to stop being a baby and to man up and play and do it in his honor and win this game for him. And that is what we are trying to do. We’re gonna go out there and try to play some dominating ball, just like he wanted.”

Kansas City’s Frank Clark grew up in Los Angeles and said he used the Lakers star as an inspiration while growing up without his father.

“There [in South Central Los Angeles] you don’t got a lot to lean on. You don’t got a lot to look forward to,” Clark said. “There’s gangs and drugs, and that’s really it. And the one person, if anything, I looked to for inspiration and all my strength growing up when I was going through the things I was going through was Kobe Bryant. He was a successful guy, and that’s the one thing you look to. You look at the gangs, and you look at the drug dealers, and then you look at the guys who are successful.”