Kobe Bryant memorial riddled with spelling errors to be repaired after more than a month of ridicule from fans

The Los Angeles Lakers have finally announced that they will correct errors on the Kobe Bryant "Black Mamba" memorial statue outside Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, the team announced.

The 19-foot bronze statue commemorates Bryant's 2006 performance against the Toronto Raptors during which he scored 81 points, the second-most points scored by an individual in an NBA game. Wilt Chamberlain scored the most, 100 points in 1962.

The memorial to Bryant includes the box score from his amazing game carved into the marble base. Unfortunately, the box score contains multiple spelling errors.

The errors included the misspelling of two players' names, Von Wafer and Jose Calderon. Wafer played for the Lakers at the time while Calderon played for the Raptors. Calderon's last name was misspelled as "Calderson," while Wafer's first name was labeled "Vom."

Perhaps most egregious, the third error was a misspelling of the word decision, which was written as "Decicion." What's worse is that the correct spelling of the word is quite literally directly above it. This error appeared to have happened twice on the statue.

“We have been aware of this for a few weeks and are already working to get it corrected soon,” the Lakers said in a statement, according to the NBA. The team also noted they would correct other minor formatting mistakes made in relation to Bryant's accomplishments.

The statue was erected on February 8, 2024, which means that more than a month had passed before the NBA and the Lakers announced that the corrections were going to be made.

Fans have ridiculed the statue online, but with that ridicule has come disappointment.

"Something like that – I just wouldn’t expect it," Lakers fan Holden Moser told NBC Los Angeles. "Like a statue of obviously a great player, you think you would want to put in as much work and make sure you don’t make any mistakes at all on it," he added.

"Well, if it’s a mistake, then that’s gotta go,” fan Miguel Custodio declared. "We know Kobe and his reputation as a perfectionist as somebody who wants to do it right, why would you have that?"

The same fan theorized that perhaps there were errors on the original scorecard that acted as the source material, however the local NBC affiliate debunked that conspiracy by investigating the original document.

The statue was designed by Julie Rotblatt Amrany, a 65-year-old sculptor who has worked with her husband Omri Amrany on many famous sports statues, including one of Michael Jordan in Chicago, Illinois. The couple's fine art studio has also been commissioned to create statues of other world-renowned athletes like David Beckham and Shaquille O'Neal.

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