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Kobe Bryant didn’t start relying on helicopters because he was a prima donna. He did it because he was a doting dad, he told Alex Rodriguez in 2018.

In a sit-down with the Barstool Sports podcast “The Corp With A-Rod and Big Cat,” Bryant explained he started taking choppers between his home in Newport Beach and Lakers practices in Los Angeles so he could be a present parent.

“Traffic started getting really, really bad, right? And I was sitting in traffic, and I wound up missing, like, a school play because I was sitting in traffic,” the father of four daughters said.

“I had to figure out a way where I could still train and focus on the craft but still not compromise family time,” he explained.

“And so that’s when I looked into helicopters, to be able to get down and back in 15 minutes. And that’s when it started,” he said.

He said he would fly back to Orange County after practice in time to “get back in carpool line” and pick his kids up.

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“My wife was like, ‘Listen, I can pick ’em up.’ I’m like, ‘No, no, no. I want to do that,'” he recalled.

“Because, like, you have road trips and times when you don’t see your kids, man,” he said. “So like every chance I get see them and spend time with them, even if it’s 20 minutes in the car, like, I want that. Right? So that would be my routine.”

Bryant, 41, died tragically in a helicopter crash in Calabasas, Calif., that also claimed the life of his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven other people Sunday.

The group was on their way from Orange County to Bryant’s Mamba Sports Academy in Thousand Oaks for a youth basketball tournament.