Tough as nails. Highly competitive. Nasty. Brutally honest.
That’s how some of Michael Cooper’s teammates summarized his 12-year Hall of Fame career — all with the Los Angeles Lakers.
The Lakers honored the five-time NBA champion at halftime of the their game against the San Antonio Spurs on Jan. 13 at Crypto.com Arena (formerly Staples Center) by retiring his jersey No. 21, joining “Showtime Lakers” teammates Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, James Worthy and Jamaal Wilkes. Cooper’s No. 21 was the 13th jersey number retired by the team.
“Cooper was the pulse of our team,” Worthy said about his former teammate on Spectrum Sportsnet. “He was an amazing teammate. [He was] competitive and brutally honest and we needed [that] in the locker room.”
Cooper only averaged 8.9 points, 3.2 rebounds and 4.2 assists during his NBA career. He hit double digits in points per game only twice (1982 and 1987). He was never named to an All-NBA team or All-Star team. But the Showtime Lakers didn’t need Cooper to score a ton of points. What they needed from him was defense, and boy did he fill that role perfectly.
Cooper was named to the NBA all-defensive teams eight times, including five times on the first team. He was named NBA Defensive Player of the Year in the 1986-87 season. He is the only non-starter in league history to win Defensive Player of the Year. Coop rode his defense all the way to Springfield, Mass., as the Pasadena, Calif., native was named to the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2024.
“When we start playing this game, we try to play for the passion and for the love of the game,” Coop said on Spectrum Sportsnet. “When you play hard, good things will come to you. And that’s all I try to do my whole career.”
“It would have been nice to be an All-Star, first team All-NBA,” Cooper continued. “But you know what, I gave it my all and through that we were able to win championships. People don’t forget winners and they don’t forget champions.”
When asked when he decided to be a defensive stopper, Cooper chuckled and said it was born out of necessity.
“When I came on the team they had Jamaal Wilkes, Norm Nixon and Kareem. Jerry West came up to me and said, ‘Coop, we ain’t got enough balls for you man so find another niche.’ So, I tried to find that and hang my hat on it.”
Coop was a Swiss Army knife on the Lakers dynasty in the 1980s. He could fill in as a point guard or shooting guard and small forward. He was a 3-and-D archetype before 3-and-D players were a thing. The Lakers would not have been able to win five NBA championships during a nine-year period without Cooper’s defense.
Under the hood of the Showtime machine was a grit and grind approach that enabled them to get stops and push the pace. Coop was usually assigned to the guard the opposing team’s best player, and would often shut off their water with his tenacity.
“When Larry Bird, one of the toughest guys to stop, says to the world that Michael Cooper was the toughest defender that he ever went up against … that to me explains everything about who [Michael Cooper] is,” Worthy said. “Around the league he was known as a nasty, physical defender. He was just an amazing defensive player. He had a plethora of defensive assignments and he dominated every one of them.”