West, Jerry

Jerry West

1938-

American basketball player

One of the best shooting guards in professional basketball history, Jerry West went on to lead the Los Angeles Lakers to basketball dominance during the last quarter of the twentieth century as first a coach and later general manager and executive vice president. After nearly four decades with the Lakers organization, West stepped down in 2000, but it did not take him long to decide that retirement was not for him. In October 2002, West hired on as president of the Memphis Grizzlies, a young team that had not yet made it into the playoffs. Nicknamed "Mr. Clutch" for his reputation for saving the game with last-minute heroics, West is the model for the silhouetted figure who is the focal point of the National Basketball Association (NBA) logo. As a player from 1960 through 1974, West became only the third player in NBA history to reach the 25,000-point plateau. He still holds the NBA record for the most free throws (840 in 1965-66) made in a single season. Only five years after leaving the game as a player, West was inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame in 1979. As his biography on the NBA's Web site states, West brought to the

game "a deadly jump shot, tenacious defense, obsessive perfectionism, unabashed confidence, and an uncompromising will to win."

Born in Cheylan, West Virginia

He was born Jerome Alan West in Cheylan, West Virginia, on May 28, 1938. One of six children of Howard Stewart (a coal mine electrician) and Cecil Sue West (a homemaker), he was kept out of sports as a boy because of his small stature. He spent much of his free time shooting basketballs at a hoop nailed to a neighbor's storage shed, gradually perfecting his shooting style. So preoccupied was the young West with his home-based basketball practice that he often forgot to eat. He dropped so much weight that he eventually was forced to take vitamin injections to preserve his health. Although he finally managed to win a spot on East Bank High School's varsity basketball team, he spent most of his junior year on the bench. The summer between his junior and senior years in high school, West experienced a much welcomed growth spurt, shooting up six inches. During his senior year, West became the first high school player in West Virginia history to score 900 points in a single season. He also led his high school team to a state championship, prompting a thankful East Bank High School to rename itself West Bank High School (for one week) in his honor.

Recruited by a number of colleges, West decided upon West Virginia University in Morgantown. The transition from a small high school to a large college full of strangers was a difficult one for West. He had drawn inward six years earlier after learning of the death of his older brother, David, in the Korean War. Although he found it difficult to handle his academic workload, he seemed to have no such difficulty on the basketball court. During his years as a West Virginia Mountaineer, West twice was named an All-American, and in 1959 he led his team to the championship game of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) tournament. Although the Mountaineers lost the NCAA championship to the University of California, West was named the tournament's most valuable player. The following summer, he joined with another dynamic guard, Oscar Robertson , to lead the U.S. Olympic basketball team to gold at the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome.

Picked by Lakers in NBA Draft

The late-blooming West was the number one pick in the first round of the 1960 NBA draft, tapped by the Minneapolis Lakers on the eve of their move to Los Angeles. Although he helped the Lakers to improve their record from a dismal 25-50 in 1959-60 to 36-43 in 1960-61, his rookie season, West years later admitted that he did not yet feel truly comfortable in the NBA. "I was like a fish out of water," he told an interviewer for NBA.com. West's comfort level must have improved significantly his second year with the Lakers, as he nearly doubled his points per game from 17.6 in his rookie season to 30.8 during the 1961-62 season. He also averaged 7.9 rebounds and 5.4 assists per game. Largely on the strength of play by West and Elgin Baylor , dubbed the "dynamic duo," the Lakers made it to the NBA finals but lost to the Celtics.

Chronology

1938	Born in Cheylan, West Virginia, on May 28
1956-60	Attends West Virginia University
1960	Picked by Minneapolis Lakers in first round of NBA draft
1974	Steps down as a player
1976	Rejoins Lakers as head coach
1979-82	Serves as special consultant to the Lakers
1982	Named general manager of the Lakers
1995	Named executive vice president of the Lakers
2000	Retires as executive with the Lakers
2002	Hired as president of the Memphis Grizzlies

West began to acquire a reputation as a perfectionist. Looking back on a game in which he hit 16 of 17 shots from the field, sank all 12 free-throw attempts, and notched 12 rebounds, 12 assists, and 10 blocked shots, West told the National Sports Daily: "Defensively, from a team standpoint, I didn't feel I played very well. Very rarely was I satisfied with how I played." He also showed a remarkable ability to withstand physical pain. According to his biography on the NBA's official Web site, West was "not blessed with great size, strength, or dribbling ability," but "made up for these deficiencies with pure hustle and an apparent lack of regard for his body. He broke his nose at least nine times. On more than one occasion West had to be helped to the court before games in which he ultimately scored 30 or 40 points."

Shines in Playoffs

As good as he was as a player overall, West really shone in the playoffs. In the Lakers' 1965 finals against the Celtics, he averaged 46.3 points per game, the highest points-per-game average for any playoff series. When the Lakers again faced off against the Celtics in the 1969 finals, West was named most valuable player, the first and only time such honors have gone to a member of the losing team. In an interview West did with NBA.com on the occasion of the NBA's 50th anniversary, West recalled: "I thought we should have won in '69—I felt we had the better team. Those are the ones that leave emotional scars." Despite West's brilliance on the basketball court, the record of the Lakers through 1970 was a study in frustration. In the nine seasons from 1962 through 1970, the Lakers made it into the finals six times but lost all six times—five times to the Celtics and once to the New York Knicks. Half of the finals in which the Lakers played went to seven games, and in two of them against the Celtics, Boston won the seventh and deciding game by a single basket.

In the 1970 finals against the Knicks, West launched his famous bomb, dazzling not only the opponents but his own teammates as well. Walt Frazier of the Knicks recalled thinking: "The man's crazy. He looks determined. He thinks it's really going in!" Much to the amazement of Frazier and others, it did, sending Game 3 of the finals into overtime. In the end, however, the Lakers again came up dry, with the Knicks taking not only Game 3 but the series as well to win the NBA championship.

Briefly Considers Retirement

As much as West wanted to win an NBA championship, the toll taken by numerous injuries had forced him to seriously consider retirement prior to the 1971-72 season. In the end, he returned to the Lakers and helped the Los Angeles team to write a new chapter in NBA history. With Baylor largely sidelined by injury, the Lakers looked to West, Wilt Chamberlain , and Gail Goodrich to carry them through. And carry them through, they did. The trio helped power the Lakers to a 33-game winning streak under new coach Bill Sharman, a former star of the Celtics. At the middle of the season, the Lakers had an unprecedented record of 39-3. The team ended the season with a record of 69-13, the best single-season record in NBA history. Throughout the regular season, West, though increasingly hampered by injuries, managed to average 25.8 points per game while leading the NBA in assists with 9.7 per game.

It began to look as though the Lakers were finally on track to win the NBA championship that they had sought for so long. In the playoffs, the Lakers demolished the Chicago Bulls in four games and took the Milwaukee Bucks in six. Facing off against the Knicks in the finals, the Lakers lost the first game to New York but came back to win the next four games in a row, all by relatively large margins, taking the team's combined record for the regular season and playoffs to a remarkable 81-16. Not only had West finally won an NBA championship, but he had done it with a team enjoying one of the greatest seasons in NBA history. Thus revitalized, West went on to play another two seasons for the Lakers. In the 1972-73 season, the Lakers again made it into the NBA finals but lost the championship to the Knicks. A pulled groin injury during the 1973-74 season kept West out of all but 31 games during the regular season and a single game in the playoffs. At season's end, West announced his retirement, telling the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner: "I'm not willing to sacrifice my standards. Perhaps I expect too much." Always high-strung, West was increasingly bothered in his later years as a player by a nervous condition.

Steps Down as Player in 1974

West left professional basketball in 1974 as the third highest career scorer in NBA history, with a total of 25,192 points in 932 games. Only Chamberlain and Robertson had better records at that time, although in the years to come five other NBA players would surpass him. His career average of 27 points per game is the fourth highest ever, behind Michael Jordan , Chamberlain, and Baylor. West still retains the record for the highest average points per game for a player over the age of 30, for 31.2 points per game during the 1969-70 season, when he was 31.

Career Statistics

	GP	PTS	P/G	FG%	FT%	REB	AST	STL	BLK
NBA Regular Season	932	25192	27.0	.474	.814	4449	6238	81	23
NBA Playoffs	153	4457	29.1	.469	.805	855	970	—	—
NBA All-Star Games	12	160	13.3	.453	.720	47	55	—	—

West's absence from basketball was relatively brief. He returned as the Lakers coach for the 1976-77 season

and over the next three years coached Los Angeles to a 145-101 record and the team's first return to the playoffs since he had left the team as a player. After three years as coach, West worked for another three years as a special consultant and scout for the Lakers and in 1982 signed on as the team's general manager. In that post he played a pivotal role in building the Lakers dynasty of the 1980s. West found that even off the court he was unable to shake the nervous condition that had troubled him in his years as a player. But he found that it was an essential part of who he was and how he operated as an executive. In a 1990 interview with the Orange County Register, West observed: "If I'm not nervous, if I don't have at least a little bit of the same self-doubt and anxious feelings I had when I started playing, then it will be time for me to go on. I must have that tension."

Named Executive Vice President

In 1995 West was named executive vice president of the Lakers. During his years as an executive with the Lakers organization, the team made it into the playoffs eight times and won the NBA championship four times (1985, 1987, 1988, and 2000). In 1995 West was named the NBA Executive of the Year. Increasingly troubled by an irregular heartbeat caused by nervous tension, West retired from basketball in the summer of 2000. After two years of relaxation away from the game, he returned to basketball again, signing on as president of the Memphis Grizzlies in October 2002.

Whipping the hapless Grizzlies into a world-class basketball team will pose a major challenge for West, but if anybody can pull it off, he can. Shortly after moving into his new post in Memphis, West told USA Today: "I'm excited about going forward with this team in terms of trying to have a team here that would be a playoff team. In many ways, that would be something that maybe would bring as much joy as I had when I worked in Los Angeles as a player and as an executive."

CONTACT INFORMATION

Address: c/o Memphis Grizzlies, 175 Toyota Pl., Ste. 150, Memphis, TN 38103. Fax: (901) 205-1235. Phone:(901) 888-4667.

Awards and Accomplishments

1959	Named most valuable player at NCAA Final Four basketball tournament
1960	Wins gold medal as member of U.S. Olympics men's basketball team
1969	Named most valuable player in NBA Finals
1972	Named most valuable player in NBA All-Star Game
1979	Inducted into Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame
1995	Named NBA Executive of the Year by Sporting News

SELECTED WRITINGS BY WEST:

(With Bill Libby) Mr. Clutch: The Jerry West Story. New York: Prentice Hall, 1969.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Books

"Jerry West." Encyclopedia of World Biography Supplement, Volume 21. Detroit: Gale Group, 2001.

"Jerry West." St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture, 5 volumes. Detroit: St. James Press, 2000.

Periodicals

Ballard, Chris. "Memphis Grizzlies: The Franchise Player Here Is New Boss Jerry West, Who Is Trying to Recreate the Magic (and Kareem) He Possessed with the Lakers." Sports Illustrated (October 28, 2002): 156.

Boeck, Greg. "Jerry West Enjoying New Challenge." USA Today (October 28, 2002).

Other

"Bill Sharman." Basketball Hall of Fame. http://www.hoophall.com/halloffamers/Sharman.htm (December 8, 2002).

"Jerry West's Career Highlights." CBS SportsLine.com. http://cbs.sportsline.com/u/ce/feature/0,1518,2644466_54,00.html (December 6, 2002).

"NBA Legends: Jerry West." NBA. http://www.nba.com/history/west_bio.html (December 6, 2002).

Sketch by Don Amerman

Related Biography: Basketball Coach Bill Sharman

An outstanding basketball player himself, Bill Sharman won NBA Coach of the Year honors in 1972 for coaching the Los Angeles Lakers to their first NBA championship ever. An important element in Sharman's winning strategy for the Lakers during the 1971-72 season was Jerry West.

Born in Abilene, Texas, on May 25, 1926, Sharman was a four-year letter winner at the University of Southern California (USC) under Hall of Fame coach Sam Barry. He was named by the Sporting News to its All-America first team in 1950 after setting a new conference scoring record of 18.6 points per game. After being graduated from USC, Sharman played for the NBA's Washington Capitols during the 1950-51 season before moving on to the Boston Celtics for 10 years, from 1951 to 1961. His last year as a pro player was spent with the Los Angeles Jets of the American Basketball League (ABL) during the 1961-62 season.

After coaching briefly with the ABL's Jets and Cleveland Pipers, Sharman took over coaching duties at California State University, Los Angeles, where he coached from 1962 through 1964. He returned to the pros in 1966 as coach of the NBA's San Francisco Warriors, moving on to the American Basketball Association's Los Angeles Stars in 1968 and the Utah Stars in 1970. Sharman's greatest glory, however, came during the five years he coached the Los Angeles Lakers, from 1971 to 1976. Sharman was the only coach in history to win championships in three different leagues.