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Social Media Comes To Vanessa Bryant’s Defense After Nike Seemingly Dropped An Unreleased Mambacita Sneaker

Kobe Bryant poses with his family at halftime after both his #8 and #24 Los Angeles Lakers jerseys are retired at Staples Center on December 18
(Photo by Maxx Wolfson/Getty Images)

Vanessa Bryant wanted to pay homage to her daughter Gianna Bryant with a Nike sneaker.

Kobe Bryant’s widow planned on releasing a Mambacita shoe with Nike. Unfortunately, it appears as though the sneaker was released to the public without her consent. Vanessa went off on Nike and spoke out on social media. She said,

“This is a shoe I worked on in honor of my daughter, Gianna. It was going to be called the MAMBACITA shoe as an exclusive black and white colorway on her daddy’s shoes. I picked the colors in honor of her uniform, the number 2 she wore just like her uniform, the inside pattern, Kobe ad Gigi on the back in gold instead of Kobe’s signature, the inside shoe details (butterfly, wings, halo), etc. The MAMBACITA shoes are NOT approved for sale.” She continues,

“I did not re-sign the Nike contract and decided not to sell those shoes. (The MAMBACITA shoes were not approved to be made in the first place). Nike has NOT sent any of these pairs to my girls and me. I do not know how someone else has their hands on shoes I designed [to honor] my daughter, Gigi and we don’t. I hope these shoes did not get sold. @Nike.”

Vanessa also asked the unidentified person who has the shoe how they got a pair. She also said she nor her family has a pair.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CPpiiCjDQRJ/?utm_medium=copy_link

Social media came to her defense. Take a look:

https://twitter.com/nomanodus/status/1400439976362455042?s=21

https://twitter.com/jamierafael15/status/1400400124656848896?s=21

https://twitter.com/tinnkky/status/1400407028951027715?s=21

Via