Sharman, Toughest Laker, Says He’s Retiring

Killing time on a coast-to-coast plane flight in 1979, I asked Jerry West, then coach of the Lakers, to name his all-time National Basketball Assn. thug team.

The first name West mentioned, with no hesitation, was Bill Sharman, the former Boston Celtics guard who happened to be the Laker general manager at the time.

West told a story then, and he re-told it Monday morning, just after Sharman had announced his retirement as president of the Lakers, effective at the end of this season.

“It was my rookie year,” West said. “We were at Madison Square Garden, playing the Celtics as part of a doubleheader. It was one of my first starts, because Elgin (Baylor) was injured.

“I hit seven straight jumpers over Bill. On the last one, he took a swing at me. He missed me, but I saw the punch go sailing past.”

What happened on West’s next shot?

“I probably shot an airball,” West said, laughing. “Bill was tough. I’ll tell you this, you did not drive by him. He got into more fights than Mike Tyson. You respected him as a player.”

The respect deepened when West played under Coach Sharman, when West coached under General Manager Sharman, and when West was general manager under President Sharman.

And Monday, while Sharman was the host at a small press conference luncheon, West sat in his office and got semi-choked up about Sharman’s impending retirement.

Sharman will be 62 next month. He’s retiring because he blew out his voice during that incredible 1971-72 Laker season, damaged forever his vocal cords. His voice got progressively worse, eventually driving him out of coaching, and the last few years, Sharman has been reduced to a non-speaking front-office role.

It has been discouraging and disheartening for Sharman. Still, he always had West in the office next door. The two conferred regularly, and their friendship and mutual respect deepened.

So West will be losing a friend and an adviser, and the Lakers will be losing the man who set the tone for the modern era of Laker basketball.

“I think Bill brought an attitude here,” West said. “He brought an attitude of work and dedication, and an intensity. In his quiet, nice way he (as coach) instilled in us that we were a better team than the people we played against. We didn’t have that before.

“I didn’t like his practices, but he gave us a discipline, and he treated you the way you wanted to be treated. I never heard him berate a player.”

Sharman was not a berserko coach, never the blow-top type. He had a naturally thin voice, and he simply strained it shouting out routine orders to his players and offering friendly advice to referees.

Further irony, Sharman burned out his voice trying to yell over the noise of the allegedly mellow and quiet L.A. fans.

When your team wins 33 games in a row, as Sharman’s Lakers did in ‘71-72, even Forum crowds can get noisy. He was a victim of his own success.

“It’s discouraging,” whispered Sharman, who has had two operations and consulted several doctors. “It’s gotten worse the last three years. The thinking is that if I get away from the day-to-day (work) routine, my voice might recover somewhat. And there are a couple doctors back East who are doing new things with voice problems. Now I’ll have time to go back there and let them see what they can do.”

Someone asked Sharman about the old thug image. Did he really try to punch out that skinny rookie, Jerry West?

“No, no, no!” Sharman protested. He smiled. “My wife thinks I’m a wimp.”

Certainly Sharman’s thug days are behind him. West was probably the last guy Sharman ever took a swing at. Now he’s the consummate gentleman. If the NBA voted on a Mr. Congeniality, Sharman would dominate the election and be embarrassed as hell about it.

Sharman is such a genial, outgoing guy, you almost forget about the man’s intensity. Consider:

--He had no great speed and couldn’t even dunk, but Sharman was named to the All-NBA first team four times in his 10 seasons. That’s more impressive when you consider that Celtic teammate Bill Russell made it three times.

--Sharman coached league championship teams in the American Basketball League, the American Basketball Assn. and the NBA.

--He invented the shoot-around, the game-day workout now standard throughout the NBA. Before Sharman, such workouts were unheard of.

--He played a key role in the early development and implementation of the 3-point shot.

--A shrewd wheeler-dealer, he traded Don Ford to Cleveland for the draft pick that got the Lakers James Worthy.

--Sharman played baseball, too, in the Dodger organization. He was called up to the majors at the end of the 1951 season, just in time to watch from the dugout as Bobby Thomson of the Giants hit a home run to beat the Dodgers in the pennant playoff.

Giant Manager Leo Durocher and infielder Eddie Stanky were rolling on the ground together in celebration. As Sharman walked past them on his way to the clubhouse, he gave Durocher a kick. Just a little one.

A guy like this is good to have around when an organization is trying to build and maintain a competitive edge, an intensity, a winning attitude, all those cliches.

Sharman has been a Laker for 17 seasons. Maybe it’s coincidence, but they shot to the top when he showed up, and they’ve more or less stayed on top these two decades.

For West, and for the Lakers, it’s going to be like the old country song, “A part of my heart is walkin’ out that door . . . “