Kobe Bryant was one of the most influential NBA players. Be it on the court with his insane performances for the Los Angeles Lakers or off the court with his signature shoes. He was an icon.

In a recent episode of the popular TV show Pawn Stars, there was a pretty extensive collection of Kobe related items that were up for sale.

These included game-worn signed sneakers, game-worn jerseys, signed warm-up jackets, etc. valued at a whopping $750,000.

Although there were a bunch of items in this collection, one item stuck out of the others. They were the Reebok Questions custom made for Kobe Bryant. This pair of shoes alone is worth $40,000 in retail. That’s one very costly pair of sneakers.

The season where Kobe Bryant was not signed with a shoe brand.

Kobe Bryant is one of the few players to have bagged shoe deals with both Adidas and Nike. But oddly, a player of Kobe’s caliber played without a shoe deal for the entirety of the 2002-03 season.

Kobe, at the age of 17, signed with Adidas. The brand had already missed out on Michael Jordan and did not want to miss out on another generational talent. He signed a six-year deal with the brand worth $48 million.

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Initially, it was all smooth sailing with Kobe and Adidas. They released their most iconic basketball sneaker in the Crazy 8 and everyone was happy, including Kobe.

However, things soon took a turn for the worse. They collaborated with Audi to design Kobe signature shoes. Their initial product, Kobe 1 was a success. It sounded weird, but if the shoe was good, everyone was happy. The Kobe 2 was the sucker punch for Adidas.

It had mixed responses, but above everyone else, Kobe didn’t like them. He was reportedly so frustrated that he paid millions to the brand in a bid to strike an agreement to bar any deals for the entire season.

Mamba played with multiple sneakers custom made for him by brands like Jordan, Nike, and Reebok for the entire 2002-03 season. Kobe finally signed with Nike to forge one of the most iconic partnerships that basketball had ever seen.