VIDEO: Kobe Bryant Responds to Criticism of Middle School Basketball IG Post With Weird Dance Clip

Kobe Bryant received some backlash on Wednesday when he took to Instagram in a rather harsh manner after his middle school girls basketball team received an award for finishing in fourth place at an AAU competition. What caught the public's eye was the fact that the Black Mamba went as far as to slight the young ladies for their commitment to the game, even calling out one player who missed the game for a dance recital. Roughly 24 hours later, and the former 18-time All-Star took to IG (again) to post a weird video of a young Kobe dancing in a school show, claiming that he skipped basketball for two weeks to partake in the event.

It's quite palpable that Bryant is posting this video to take some of the heat away from his initial controversial post. Calling out a little girl because she wanted to take part in a dance recital should be considered overboard-- even to the legions of Kobe stans that are known to mobilize on social media with the best of them.

When the dust settled, it was clear that Kobe was being uncharitable, if not hypocritical. Fortunately, he came around and recognized that.

All told, we don't doubt that Kobe had nothing but good intentions behind the original social post, surely motivating his girls to be better by adopting that renowned Mamba Mentality.

Hopefully, the future Hall of Famer learned how easily a post like that could be spun into a negative light. Expect him to alter his approach the next time around.