Jerry West
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- "Jerry West" was also a pseudonym used by Andrew E. Svenson.
| Position | Guard/Forward |
|---|---|
| Nickname | Mr. Clutch, Zeke from Cabin Creek |
| Height | 6 ft 3 in (1.91 m) |
| Weight | 180 lb (82 kg) |
| Nationality |  United States |
| Born | May 28, 1938 Chelyan, West Virginia |
| College | West Virginia University |
| Draft | 1st Round, 1960 Los Angeles Lakers |
| Pro career | 1960–1974 |
| Former teams | Los Angeles Lakers 1960-1974 |
| Awards | Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Player Inductee (1979) NBA 50 Greatest Players (1996) 10-time All-NBA First Team (1962-67, 1970-73) 1969 NBA Finals MVP 13-time All-Star selection (1961-73) NBA All-Star MVP (1972) |
| Hall of Fame | 1980 |
| Olympic medal record | |||
| Men's Basketball | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Gold | 1960 Rome | United States | |
Jerry Alan West (born May 28, 1938, in Chelyan, West Virginia) is a retired basketball player who played his entire professional career in the NBA's Los Angeles Lakers. West has also had a successful career as a coach and as an executive. He was enshrined in the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1980, and his dribbling silhouette has long been used in the National Basketball Association's official logo.[1]
Like most NBA players, West was a standout in high school and at college, attending West Virginia University and leading it to the 1959 NCAA championship game (of which he was named Most Valuable Player) before embarking on a 14-year career with the Los Angeles Lakers. He also played for, and co-captained with Oscar Robertson, the 1960 U.S. Olympic gold medal team in Rome.
His nicknames included "Mr. Clutch," for his skill and ability to make a shot in a clutch situation, and "Zeke from Cabin Creek," given to him by teammate Elgin Baylor, and one West was not particularly fond of. The latter name is somewhat of a misnomer, but not completely; Cabin Creek is the name of both a stream and a community near West's hometown of Chelyan. The community of Cabin Creek is on the opposite side of the stream from Chelyan as it enters the Kanawha River.
For a period of time in certain parts of West Virginia, West's home state, pee-wee basketball was known as Jerry West basketball. It was used in the same context that youth baseball leagues use with Babe Ruth baseball, or youth football leagues use Pop Warner football.
In the summer of 2000, the city of Morgantown, West Virginia, and West Virginia Governor Cecil Underwood, dedicated the road outside of the West Virginia University Basketball Coliseum, "Jerry West Boulevard." The same road is shared on the south end of Morgantown with Don Knotts Boulevard, in honor of another WVU alumnus.
On November 26, 2005, his number 44 became the first basketball number to be retired by West Virginia University.
On February 17, 2007, a bronze statue of him was honored outside of the WVU Coliseum.
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[edit] Early life and sports
Jerry West attended East Bank, West Virginia, High School from 1952-1956. He was named an All-State from 1953-56, and an All-American in 1956, when he was also named West Virginia Player of the Year after becoming the state's first high-school player to score more than 900 points in a season (32.2 ppg, 1956). He also led East Bank to a state championship that same year. Due to West's tremendous play in the state championship, the school of East Bank changes its name every year on that same day to West Bank.
He played for the West Virginia University Mountaineers, in Morgantown, West Virginia, from 1956-1960. Among his college highlights, he was named to the All-Southern Conference (1958-60), All-American Second Team (1958), and The Sporting News All-America First Team (1959-60). In his WVU career, he averaged 24.8 points and 13.3 rebounds per game.
In addition to the Olympic Games, he was a member of the U.S. Pan American Games gold medal-winning team (1959).
[edit] NBA career
Drafted in the NBA, West spent his entire professional career (1960-74) with the Los Angeles Lakers franchise. Although he was teamed with Hall-of-Fame scorer Elgin Baylor for most of his career, West still averaged more than 30 points per game in four different seasons and led the league in scoring during the 1969-70 season. An excellent playmaker, West also led the league in assists per game during the 1971-72 season. Although steals weren't recorded by the NBA until West's final season, at age 35 West became the first player in the league to ever record 10 steals in a single game — still the Lakers franchise record.
Heralded as one of the most legendary clutch shooters in the NBA's history, West averaged 29.1 points per game in 153 playoff games, including 40.6 in 11 playoff games in 1965, and sank one of the most famous shots in NBA history: a 60-footer with no time remaining to send Game 3 of the 1970 NBA Finals against the New York Knicks into overtime, a game the Lakers ultimately lost.
West played in nine NBA Finals, but finished his career with only one championship, won in the 1971-72 season, the year the Lakers established a modern North American professional sports record of 33 straight wins. He retired two years later, after leading the Lakers to yet another Pacific Division title in the 1973-74 season — this, in spite of the loss of legendary center Wilt Chamberlain to retirement. As a testimony to West's on-court leadership and presence, the Lakers fell to the Pacific Division cellar the year after he retired, posting a 30-52 record. West later became a coach who carried the Lakers into the playoffs in his three seasons 1976-1979, after which he was hired as an executive for the club in various positions.
When he retired, West had scored 25,192 points, averaged 27.0 points per game, and made 7,160 free throws and 6,238 assists. During his career, West was named to the NBA All-Defensive First Team four times (the NBA All-Defensive Team did not exist until West's ninth season), to the All-NBA First Team 10 times, and played in the All-Star Game 13 times. West was named the All-Star Game MVP in 1972. West is still the only player ever to be named NBA Finals MVP when on a losing team. He accomplished this in the 1969 NBA Finals against Boston, the first year the award was given. In 1980 he was named to the NBA's 35th Anniversary All-Time Team and in 1996 was selected as one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History.
[edit] Management
In 1982, Jerry West was named general manager of the Lakers, and through shrewd trades and draft picks, maintained the Lakers' status in the NBA elite for the rest of the decade. These teams were built around the core of Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and James Worthy, and would go on to win four more championships in 1982, 1985, 1987 and 1988, becoming the first team to win back-to-back championships since the great Boston Celtics dynasty did so in 1968 and 1969.
Following a slump in the early 1990s, West received the NBA Executive of the Year Award in 1995 after his Lakers reached the playoffs with a team built around Nick Van Exel, Eddie Jones, Cedric Ceballos, and Vlade Divac. West is credited for bringing Kobe Bryant onto the team, trading Divac to the Charlotte Hornets for Bryant's draft rights, and signing free agent Shaquille O'Neal to the team, which would later go on to win three consecutive NBA titles.
In 2002 he was hired as president of basketball operations by the Memphis Grizzlies. Although it was the worst team in the NBA at that time, West quietly rebuilt the squad. In 2004, the Grizzlies won 50 games for the first time in their history, and West was named NBA Executive of the Year for the second time.
He currently lives in Memphis with his wife. His son, Jonnie, is a freshman on the West Virginia University basketball team.
West recently put his Memphis home up for sale for just under $4 million. Rumor has it that he and his wife are looking for a smaller home.
[edit] See also
- List of Individual NBA Scoring Champions
- List of National Basketball Association players with 60 or more points in a game
[edit] References
- ^ Jerry West, bookrags.com, accessed March 8, 2007
[edit] External links
| Preceded by Elgin Baylor |
NCAA Basketball Tournament Most Outstanding Player (men's) 1959 |
Succeeded by Jerry Lucas |
| Preceded by Bill Sharman |
Los Angeles Lakers Head Coach 1976–1979 |
Succeeded by Jack McKinney |
| 1960 Olympic Champions Men's Basketball |
|---|
|
Jay Arnette | Walt Bellamy | Bob Boozer | Terry Dischinger | Burdette Haldorson | Darrall Imhoff |
| Coach: Pete Newell |
Chamberlain (NBA Finals MVP) | Cleamons | Ellis | Goodrich | Hairston | McMillian | Riley | Robinson | Trapp | West | Coach Sharman
Categories: 1938 births | American basketball players | Basketball Hall of Fame | Living people | Los Angeles Lakers coaches | Los Angeles Lakers players | Los Angeles Lakers | Memphis Grizzlies | National Basketball Association broadcasters | National Basketball Association executives | Olympic competitors for the United States | People from West Virginia | West Virginia Mountaineers men's basketball players | American basketball coaches
