The game of basketball losing one of its all time greats as the longtime Laker Jerry West passed away Wednesday at the age of 86.
While most people remember West as one of the best players in NBA history after leading the Lakers to the NBA Finals, nine times, he only won one championship as a player. But as an executive, he won eight rings including five more as the architect of the Showtime Lakers of the 1980’s.
In 2002, Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley brought West to Memphis and while he didn’t win a title as the team’s President of Basketball Operations between 2002 and 2007, West did help lay the foundation of what is now one of the top young teams in the NBA.
West was in charge when the Grizzlies made their first ever playoff appearance. A team that would go on to make the postseason in three straight seasons.
He hired Hubie Brown and signed the likes of Mike Miller.
West would go on to win Executive of the Year in Memphis in 2004.
His life and legacy will live on forever as West’s silhouette ‘is’ the NBA logo and has been since 1969, though the league has never publicly acknowledged it was West. Commissioner Adam Silver said back in 2021 that while the league has never officially declared that the logo is Jerry West, it quote “sure looks a lot like him.”
The NBA will pay tribute to the fallen icon before game three of the NBA Finals in Dallas.
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