Michael Cooper was something of an unsung hero for the Los Angeles Lakers of the 1980s. While he never made an All-Star game, he was a multifaceted role player who was integral to their five championship teams.
He was a great 3-point shooter (in fact, he was one of the NBA’s first real 3-point threats), a good transition finisher and a reliable backup point guard behind Magic Johnson. His greatest strength was defense. He won the 1987 Defensive Player of the Year award, and Boston Celtics great Larry Bird said Cooper guarded him as well as or better than anyone else did.
Days ago, Cooper was voted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame after being nominated multiple times. On his “Showtime with Coop” podcast, he admitted when he first heard the news, he thought it was a joke (h/t Lakers Nation).
“I’m laying in the bed and I knew the call was coming that day and at 9:08, don’t forget that 9:08, I get a call and it’s Jerry Colangelo. And he’s saying they’re talking and you know I had heard that talk two other times before and they go ‘you know Coop, you’re a Hall of Famer, but you didn’t get in this time.’ And finally I just kinda like went numb you know because they were talking, but I couldn’t quite hear what they were talking about, my wife was sitting next to me and they said, ‘Coop you got in.’
“So I’m sitting there and I’m just kind of like looking and waiting for them to say you didn’t get in and my wife said ‘Babe, you got in.’ I said what? She said, ‘They said you got in’ and I let out this yell, man. And then when I got my senses back I said, ‘Is this an April Fool’s joke?’ And they were kind of like ‘No, Coop, you really got in, congratulations!’ I was like you know this is very, very cruel, because everybody wants to get into the Hall of Fame. Coming with that joke on April Fool’s, but you know what, it turned out to be true. It was last Monday, here we are this Monday, April 9 I believe we’re in today, and this was April 1 and it was like a whirlwind.
“I mean once they said that then I get all these phone calls about what you got to do. Final Four is in Phoenix, I catch a plane on Wednesday or Thursday, I’m in Phoenix and then everything just starts happening. So it’s been a real wonderful, chaotic, enjoyable, hectic 72 hours. But you know what, I am so, so happy. You know I never as a young man growing up here, and you know my story from beginning to end, never thought that my footsteps would be at the door and I would actually be knocking, and it’s official but it’s not official, and be knocking and that door opens and say Coop come on in. And with the greatest players that’s ever played this basketball game, guys I grew up (watching). Walt Bellamy, Connie Hawkins, John Havlicek, players of that magnitude for me, just to name those few and here I am gonna be immortalized with the best. I am really, really grateful. I feel very, very blessed.”
What probably finally tipped the scales in Cooper’s favor was his success after his playing career ended in 1990. He coached the WNBA’s Los Angeles Sparks to back-to-back titles in the early 2000s, then guided the G League’s Albuquerque Thunderbirds to a league title in 2006.
More recently, he had been the head coach for the University of Southern California women’s basketball team and 3’s Company of the Big3 League, as well as Chadwick School and Culver City High School in the greater Los Angeles area.