It looks like the ride on the Kobe Bryant publicity train is almost over for Italian club Virtus Bologna, but the team is going public trying to milk it for all its worth.
Not that they didn’t want him — they re-arranged the league’s schedule to help facilitate his arrival. It’s just that it was always a long shot. And not one of those Kobe late-game fade-away threes long, more like three-quarters court long. But Virtus tried, all the while milking the publicity.
The club spoke again with Kobe’s agent and is down to asking for a one-game deal for the Lakers superstar, according to Sportando.
Claudio Sabatini, owner of Virtus Bologna, confirmed at Radiofuturoshow Station that he had another conference call with Kobe’s agent and that it is real the hypotesis ‘one game’ for Bryant. ‘Last night we had another conference call with Bryant’s agent. Now we just have to wait the contract. We accepted his financial request and we submitted him two different proposals, for one game or for 40 days. Now the decision is up to him. We thought about the one game option to speed up the negotiations. He could land on Sunday, play the game against Benetton Treviso next Wednesday and maybe stay longer with us. People who don’t agree about the idea to have Kobe for just one game, have to understand that we all hope he can stay longer. Furthermore, Kobe has to be back to States in two weeks because of his sponsor. Now we are waiting for his final answer. We can just say that we tried to do as much as we could to have him with us’ said Sabatini, as reported by Bolognabasket.it.
There is a slim chance Kobe will approve some form of a deal. Stranger things have happened, like Kobe having a teammate named World Peace. But I wouldn’t bet on it.
