Letters: Jerry West a Clipper? Is it April Fools?

June 16, 2017 3:05 PM PT

Well, at least Jerry West isn’t a Celtic.

Vaughn Hardenberg

Westwood

Maybe Jerry West can convince Steve Ballmer to move the Clippers back to San Diego.

Steve Shaevel

Woodland Hills

I hope Jerry West doesn’t play in any golf tournaments now that he is a Clippers employee. He’ll never get past the second round.

Rich Sieger

North Hollywood

Name the NBA team:

Lose a lot of games each year

Acquire marginal free agent players with high-priced long term contracts

Keep non-effective management around for years

Experience serious injuries to key personnel

Replace your coach frequently

Skip the opportunity to hire the best basketball executive of all time

Sounds like the Clippers of old, but now it spells Lakers!

Dennis Butkovich

North Hills

Jerry West is a Lakers legend, as a player and a general manager. No doubt. But, even as great as he was as a GM, our Lakers still won four NBA titles in the 16 years without him. So good luck with the Clippers, Zeke. If you can turn those once-perennial losers into a championship-caliber squad, you’ll be the real Magic man.

Marty Zweben

Palos Verdes Estates

Here’s hoping that one of the greatest Lakers of all time isn’t treated by his new employer as poorly as they treated his former NBA Hall of Fame teammate, Elgin Baylor.

Richard Whorton

Studio City

Jeanie Buss is going to be sorry that she listened to the people that told her not to bring back Jerry West.

Sol Bialeck

Van Nuys

Bill Plaschke is right on when he describes the nightmare scenario for Lakers fans with Jerry West going to the Clippers. The announcement of this coincides with the 50th anniversary of the Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” Here’s a possible renaming of some of the songs.

1. Captain Magic’s Breaking Heart Club Band

2. With No Help From The Buss Family again

3. Lakers In A Hole Which seems To Never Get Better

4. For The Benefit Of Steve Ballmer

5. He Was Within Us Now He’s Without Us

6. He’s Leaving Home

7. You Still Need Me When I’m 79

and finally

8. A Sad Day In The Life of Lakers Fans

Allan Kandel

Los Angeles

Having a ball

For a league that cherishes parity so much that it winks at teams dumping games in order to get a better lottery chance, you’d think the NBA would care more about the imbalances created by free agency.The addition of Karl Malone and Gary Payton to my Lakers was pathetic, LeBron James and Chris Bosh joining Miami was so calculating, but Kevin Durant’s move was the last straw.

Goodbye, NBA, you’ve joined the “one and done” NCAA.

David Wilczynski

Manhattan Beach

Before we anoint the Golden State Warriors as the best team ever, ask yourself a question: Who would defend Shaquille O’Neal or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar after Draymond Green fouls out? (Hint: nobody!).

Richard Raffalow

Valley Glen

Haters gonna hate. LeBron James just lost his fifth NBA Finals, to go with three wins. But three of those losses are dubious.

James got swept in the 2007 Finals by the loaded San Antonio Spurs when he was the only star player on the Cavaliers. Two years ago, he lost when his two star teammates were unable to play due to injury against the upstart Warriors.

And this year’s Finals was the three-star Cavaliers against the Western Conference All-Star team. LeBron played as good as it gets (he averaged a triple-double in the five games) and cemented his reputation as the best player on the planet.

Make no mistake, the better overall team won in 2017 and Kevin Durant was on a mission. Kudos to the Golden State Warriors. But criticism of LeBron James is totally unwarranted.

Gino Cirignano

Playa del Rey

Reader Stephen Mattson stated that if Jerry Buss were still alive, he would not select Lonzo Ball with his team’s No. 1 draft pick, but would package the pick with a young player and get a couple of “solid veterans.” As I recall, Buss didn’t do that back in 1979. He selected a kid who had played two years at Michigan State, who then led them to the NBA championship. Get a grip.

Ralph S. Brax

Lancaster

If Dr. Buss were still around, he clearly would not deal the No. 2 overall pick in a draft widely considered to be very strong at the top for anything less than absolutely top-drawer talent, and those types of trades, such as the ones that yielded Hall of Famers Kareem (already in) and Pau (someday for sure) to the Lakers do not occur in today’s star-obsessed NBA.

Dr. Buss always went for the championship move.

George Legg

Rolling Hills Estates

Dodging it

Memo to Andrew Friedman: It’s really just a spring update I have been saying from time to time for the better part of the last 2 1/2 seasons.

Trade, demote, or release Chris Hatcher yesterday.

Harry Bluebond

Valley Village

SportsNet LA should offer Dodgers viewers a “Joe Davis only” audio option for its TV broadcasts. In that way, Dodgers fans would be well informed on the game, and avoid that nauseating over-earnest chatterbox Orel Hershiser. I, for one, would pay extra for that option.

Harley F. Pinson

Bakersfield

In Anaheim….

Monday night the Yankees’ starting lineup had four .300 hitters; the Angels had none, but did have two starters below the Mendoza line, so far below they probably weren’t hitting their weight: Espinosa .166 and Valbuena (batting fifth) .173.

Little wonder attendance is down.

Jack Wishard

Los Angeles

Instead of trying to gain market share with the Dodgers in all of Southern California, which will not happen in the near or distant future, the Angels should be more concerned that they are playing the role of bridesmaid in their own backyard. Cal State Fullerton is unquestionably the premier baseball team in the O.C.

Larry Herrera

Redondo Beach

Ice time

With the NHL celebrating 100 years of hockey this year, (and having followed it all for the last 55 years), I was appalled at the blown call that negated the Predators’ goal in Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final. If “human error” by an out-of-position official can determine a championship, why are there cameras covering every inch of ice?

Philip DiGiacomo

Pacific Palisades

I would not have been surprised had Sidney Crosby passed the Cup off to the ref to let him have a go around the ice with it.

Dan Johnson

Salem, Va.

The Hall truth

Thank you to the Baseball Hall of Fame and the geniuses holding the key to entry for confirming what has been known for as long as Pete has been eligible for induction: You are an irrelevant, astoundingly hypocritical institution and you degrade the accomplishments of every person already inducted by blindly keeping Pete out. Broke the ultimate rule? Give me a break. Examining just the tip of the iceberg of mindless hypocrisy — as long as Gaylord Perry, who blatantly cheated throughout his entire career and would not have had a career if not for cheating in the game itself, you are a ridiculous shell of an institution. As long as Roberto Alomar, who spit in the face of an umpire, is in, you are a comical brick and mortar artifice honoring no one and defaming all you pretend to recognize.

Richard A. Lovich

Burbank

Horses and courses

So Santa Anita is going to possibly race three days a week. It seems a far cry of this once grand cathedral that housed racing legends such as Seabiscuit, Affirmed, Ack Ack, Vigors, Spectacular Bid and John Henry. I can remember when crowds of 50,000 people were the norm on the weekends to see these immortals. Even during the week, Santa Anita would draw 25,000 fans. Now since the advent of off-track sites and TVG, crowds resemble that of a high school football game.

Here’s hoping that The Great Race Place doesn’t turn into The Late Race Place.

Craig London

Encino

You make the call

The Times got it wrong. Rafael Nadal winning his 10th French Open should have been on the front page of the sports section, and the U.S.-Mexico 1-1 tie should have been on the last page.

Dave Thoma

Ventura

Hype it up

We’ve heard of the “Thrilla in Manila,” so let’s call the upcoming fight between McGregor and Mayweather the “Brawl where nobody cares at all”!!

Richard Katz

Los Angeles

The Mayweather-McGregor fight is now finalized for Aug. 26. And somewhere, the ghost of Al Capone is laughing in his empty vault.

Mark J. Featherstone

Windsor Hills

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