I know I'm late to the party on this, but the two are not mutually exclusive.
To be honest, I don't know if he was guilty of sexual assault/rape - generally speaking, where there is smoke, there is fire, but it's also not hard to consider the possibility that he was falsely accused. It's unfortunate that the only two people who know the truth are Kobe (now deceased) and the woman (who I imagine is legally bound not to discuss the case and probably wants to put the incident behind her).
I was sad hearing about Kobe's death, but not because I thought he was a terrific human being who affected my life in any meaningful way. I was sad because he was obviously a generational talent who meant a great deal to literally millions of people. I'm not going to pretend that I know why people admired/loved him so much, we all have different reasons for picking our heroes. There is also a sadness in seeing that he doesn't get to live the next chapter of his life, as Kobe the man, instead of Kobe the basketball superstar. Compounding matters is the tragic death of his daughter.
As other posters mentioned, distilling a person's life and impact into a single event is impossible. Kobe, like the rest of us, is human - prone to the same mistakes, shortcomings and errors in judgement that everybody else is. I think it is possible to recognize the bad in a person, while also being able to appreciate the good. Seeing grown men weep openly over his death clearly illustrates his impact beyond the game of basketball.
