Philadelphia Inquirer sports columnist MIKE SIELSKI, host of podcast I AM KOBE

ABOUT MIKE SIELSKI AND I AM KOBE<br /><br />How did Kobe Bryant craft the passion, the determination, and the strength to become a legend? This remarkable series reveals intimate, never-before-heard tapes of Kobe as a teenager, exploring his thoughts, his dreams, and his goals. Philadelphia journalist Mike Sielski tells the story of Kobe Bryant's early years, weaving together these tapes and speaking with Kobe's high school coaches, his friends, his family, and the figures who knew him in his youth, to paint an enthralling documentary portrait of the making of an icon. Before he was an outsized global basketball celebrity for the Los Angeles Lakers, a 5-time NBA champion, an 18-time All-Star, an Academy Award-winning filmmaker, a children's-book author, a husband, a father, and sometimes a lightning rod for controversy, Kobe Bryant was a kid from Philadelphia.<br /><br /> <br /><br />ABOUT MIKE SIELSKI<br /><br /> <br /><br />Mike Sielski is a sports journalist and author. Born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, and raised just outside Philadelphia, Mike holds degrees from La Salle University of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He has been a sports columnist at the Philadelphia Inquirer since 2013 and was named the top sports columnist in America by the Sports Editors of the Associated Press. He is the author of The Rise: Kobe Bryant and the Pursuit of Immortality, Fading Echoes: A True Story of Rivalry and Brotherhood from the Football Field to the Fields of Honor and the co-author of How to Be Like Jackie Robinson: Life Lessons from Baseball's Greatest Hero.<br /><br /> <br /><br />Here's the trailer:<br /><br /> <br /><br /><a href="https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-i-am-kobe-88866948/" rel="noopener">https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-i-am-kobe-88866948/</a><br /><br />ABOUT HIS BOOK THE RISE, AVAILABLE JANUARY 11TH<br /><br /> <br /><br />Sunday, January 26, 2020.<br /><br /> <br /><br />The relative serenity of that day was shattered as breaking news erupted over the airwaves. A tragic h