Opinion | The Jerry West of HBO’s ‘Winning Time’ wasn’t real

We ran that pink gentle, however … we actually wanted to choose up Amelia from dance class.

We had an excessive amount of to drink, however … Uncle Joey solely turns 37 as soon as.

We watch because the characters in our nonfiction books turn out to be exaggerated within the identify of leisure, however …

That final one. It’s me. Sorta me, no less than. A decade in the past, I wrote “Showtime,” a e-book that chronicled the highs and lows of the Eighties Lakers. My work wound up being optioned by HBO, and the community ran two seasons of the ensuing program, “Successful Time.” And, to be one hundred pc clear, I liked nearly all the pieces about “Successful Time.” I liked Quincy Isaiah as Magic Johnson and Sean Patrick Small as Larry Fowl. I liked Adrien Brody as Pat Riley and Solomon Hughes as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. “Successful Time” introduced my favourite period {of professional} basketball again to life and launched generations of younger viewers to those that walked the earth earlier than LeBron James and Luka Doncic. From starting to finish, I used to be dazzled by the writing and a spotlight to element. Early on, I obtained a name from a producer, asking whether or not I knew what materials was used for the 1979 Nationwide Basketball Affiliation Summer time League uniforms.

“As a result of,” he stated, “we wish to recreate them.”

By means of the nonstop highs, nonetheless, the one factor that left me semi-conflicted was the depiction of Jerry West, the legendary Lakers guard and normal supervisor who died this week at 86. As detailed in his autobiography, “West by West: My Charmed, Tormented Life,” he was a person who suffered bouts of despair, nervousness, self-loathing and temper swings. In my many years protecting sports activities, I’ve recognized of two individuals who struggled to observe their very own groups play — one was Billy Beane, the longtime normal supervisor of the Oakland Athletics. The opposite was West.

Usually, when the Lakers have been on the court docket, West may very well be discovered within the bowels of the Discussion board in Inglewood, Calif., pacing, stretching, biting his nails and tapping his toes. Or he is perhaps sitting inside his Buick in an in any other case empty car parking zone, listening to the sport on the radio and pounding his fists into the steering wheel with every botched layup.

He had served because the staff’s head coach for 3 seasons within the late Nineteen Seventies, and whereas the 145-101 file suggests success, he couldn’t deal with the gig’s anxieties. How may Jerry West — one of many biggest skills of all time — muster the endurance to show journeymen akin to Earl Tatum and Dave Robisch the right approach to shoot a jumper? Reply: He couldn’t. It almost drove him to insanity.

In “Successful Time,” actor Jason Clarke was sensible as West. Hell, past sensible. He nailed his slight West Virginia twang, his cocksure strut, his at-all-costs love for the Lakers. There’s a scene within the pilot wherein West explains to staff executives that it will be a mistake to pick out Michigan State’s Johnson with the primary choose within the 1979 draft; a safer wager could be Sidney Moncrief of Arkansas.

When Jerry Buss (performed by John C. Reilly) asks why, West — with all of the earnestness one can muster — says, “He’s too tall.”

Buss scoffs on the suggestion, as do these standing close by — and West loses it. He storms off, snaps his golf membership in half and, whereas stomping away, growls, “I f—ing busted my shaft, Pedro!”

It’s superior stuff, and I nonetheless snicker every time the scene crosses my display screen. Nevertheless it’s additionally (ahem) not actual. The second by no means occurred. There was no Pedro, and whereas West was (in a uncommon bout of personnel misjudgment) really against deciding on Johnson, he actually didn’t break it right down to Buss on a golf course. In that very same episode, West is proven launching the 1969 Finals MVP award by his workplace window (didn’t occur) and has Buss advise him to modify to an alcohol that doesn’t trigger his breath to reek (positively didn’t occur).

All through the collection, West is usually cursing, snarling, snapping, biting. It’s great tv. For my cash, Clarke carried the present. However, in the actual world, West wasn’t a cursing, snarling, snapping, biting man. He was a burdened, haunted, troubled man who — whereas actually able to an excellent outburst — primarily internalized his demons. He additionally was a beloved basketball lifer who embraced the variety of the game he cherished.

As creator of the supply materials, but in addition as somebody concerned with the present, I usually discovered myself publicly backing Clarke’s model of West by providing up explanations like “It’s paying homage” and “That is how the medium works.” However, sitting right here right now within the aftermath of West’s passing, I’m compelled to ask myself whether or not that was me being true to myself or simply being a man with the golden ticket of an HBO present justifying an expertise that I concurrently liked and profited from.

The reply: I truthfully don’t know.