Our idea establishes Kobe as “The Conductor,” a maestro who turns hateful jeers into a delightful symphony. The message is clear: rather than shy away from the hate and change his persona, Kobe used it as motivation. For 20 years he’s been true to himself, earning the respect of his detractors.

We brought the idea to life with a film that ran during Kobe’s final game. Bryant hits a game-winning shot on a hostile court, inciting chants of “Kobe, you suck!” throughout the arena. As the lights dim, Kobe responds with a reinterpretation of Otis Redding’s classic ballad, “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long.” This version proclaims, “I’ve been hating you too long.”

We used the idea of loving to hate Kobe to spark conversation across channels—inviting fans around the world to weigh in on where they fall on the love-hate spectrum.

We declared April 13 #MambaDay, giving fans a rallying cry to express their closing arguments of love and hate for Kobe. Leading up to the day, we launched films showing world-class athletes weighing in on the debate.

On April 13 we made #MambaDay Twitter’s promoted trend. The first post every user saw was the release of our tribute film “The Conductor.” A custom integration added an emoji of Nike’s Kobe shoe to each tweet that contained the hashtag.

The film debuted in broadcast during the fourth quarter of Kobe’s epic 60-point final game, and simultaneously during the Golden State Warriors’ record-setting 73rd season win. It also ran across social channels, hoops channels, gaming platforms, and prime broadcast moments.

In addition, throughout the day, we invited fans to voice their opinion on Kobe’s contentious career with a Nike.com meme generator and a national Snapchat Geofilter.

“The Conductor” was viewed over 114M times across TV, digital/social channels, and inside the Staples Center arena and outdoor complex.

It drove 17M social engagements among our youth basketball audience. That included the most uses of a promoted trend hashtag (2.1M #MambaDay uses) ever on Twitter, and it was the most shared Nike post of all time (128k retweets).

Nike’s #MambaDay Snapchat Filter was the most viewed Geofilter of all time, viewed 266M times on the platform.