LOS ANGELES — Hector Vargas had a lot to ponder on Valentine’s Day, when his girlfriend offered him a choice of two gifts: a Nikon D7200 camera or tickets to a Los Angeles Lakers game.
Vargas, 26, a nighttime security guard and avid amateur photographer from Simi Valley, Calif., had coveted that Nikon, a $1,100 camera. Yet the tickets enticed him in a different, deeper way. Vargas, a Lakers fan since childhood, had been yearning to see Kobe Bryant play in person one more time before Bryant retired at the end of the season. This felt like his last opportunity to do it.