Kobe Bryant recently said he is proud of the bromance he shares with soccer star and best pal Lionel Messi.

"We're the same, Messi and I," Latina Magazine reports Bryant marveled on Sports Center. "As people, in the way that we speak, we are different - he's a very reserved person - but we are the same in the love that we feel for our sports."

Easily ranked as one of the best NBA players to ever play the game, Bryant also saw Messi as his equal in terms of talent and in the way each has dominated his respective sport. The two were introduced through mutual friend Ronaldinho, who told Bryant, "Mira Kobe, I'm going to introduce you to the guy who's about to become the GOAT."

Having already announced his plan to retire at the end of his 20th season, Bryant is in the middle of a farewell tour that has NBA fans turning out in droves to say goodbye to the Los Angeles Lakers star and five-time NBA champion.

As part of the sendoff, there is now a growing movement to have Bryant named to his 18th All-Star Game, this year scheduled to take place in Toronto in February. Fan voting recently commenced, and now Commissioner Adam Silver has jumped on the Kobe bandwagon.

"I hope to see him there," Silver recently told Sirius NBA Radio. "I think he deserves to be there. He's going to retire as one of the NBA's greatest players. Even beyond his play on the floor, he's played as great a role as anyone in the international expansion of the game."

Over the Lakers' first 31 games, the 37-year-old Bryant has averaged a team leading 17.2 points, four rebounds and three assists, with an average of 30 minutes per a night.