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.”

Despite the return of Kobe Bryant, the Lakers are off their worst start since the 1957-58 season. (GETTY IMAGES)

The look on Kobe Bryant’s face said it best.

After dropping a game to the Phoenix Suns on Tuesday night, Bryant walked off the Staples Center court shaking his head and looking dejected. His Lakers fell to 0-5. It is the worst start in Lakers history since the 1957-58 season when the team was still in Minneapolis.

The only people who had a worst night than the Lakers were the Democrats after the party suffered another shellacking in the midterm elections at the hands of the Republicans. The GOP is now in control of both the House and the Senate in eight years.

It seems like it has been eight years since the last time the Lakers won an NBA game.

The start of the 2014-15 season for the Lakers is about as bad as President Barack Obama’s approval rating. L.A. is struggling to stop dribble penetration, and it doesn’t have the rim protector to erase any defensive mistakes.

The Lakers are also struggling to find consistency on offense. Bryant did have 39 points against the Suns, but he was 14-for-37 from the field.

“Kobe sees the people around him and there’s nobody out there who can score except maybe for Jeremy Lin,” former Lakers standout Michael Cooper said on Time Warner Cable Sports Network. “But at the same time he has to make the players around him better. You have to be able to kick that basketball out and trust your teammates to get shots.

“But that’s Kobe being Kobe. He’s doing everything he can to try to get a win.”

Bryant said he was just being aggressive, and didn’t think the volume of shots was the reason why his team lost. But NBA Hall-of-Famer James Worthy thinks 37 shots is way too many, even for someone with the talent of Kobe.

“That’s almost 40 shots. That’s a lot of shots,” Worthy said. “It would take me three games or four games to get 40 shots. This is Kobe. Kobe is competitive, man. He has the drive. And if no one else is doing anything he’s just gonna go for it.”

It’s hard to blame Bryant for hijacking the offense. Look around the Lakers roster and you’d be hard pressed to find someone who you can honestly say is a legitimate NBA starter other than Kobe.

Lin and Jordan Hill are nice complementary players, but they’re better coming off the bench. That would have been Lin’s primary role if Steve Nash was still active. Wesley Johnson is another in a long line of Syracuse players who became NBA busts. And the Lakers are finding out why the Chicago Bulls couldn’t wait to unload Carlos Boozer.

If you look deeper into the Lakers bench and you see a bunch of guys who are D-league level. Ronnie Price, Wayne Ellington, Ryan Kelly, Jordan Clarkson, Ed Davis, Xavier Henry and Robert Sacre would be wondering additions to the L.A. D-Fenders. Sacre makes Samaki Walker look like James Worthy.

The only player with a lot of promise is rookie forward Julius Randle. But he’s out for the season with a broken leg.

Lakers fans better used to these shellackings because it’s going to be awhile before this team gets good again.

Gary Payton and Michael Jordan went head-to-head in the 1996 NBA Finals. (GETTY IMAGES)

The Glove. The nickname fit Gary Payton like Isotoners.

He got his nickname “The Glove” when Payton’s cousin called him during the 1993 Western Conference Finals series against Phoenix and told him, “you’re holding Kevin Johnson like a baseball in a glove,” and the nickname was born.

The only point guard ever to win the NBA Defensive Player of the Year award, Payton is widely considered one of the greatest of all time at that position. He was selected to the NBA All-Defensive First Team nine times, an NBA record he shares with Michael Jordan, Kevin Garnett and Kobe Bryant. He was selected to the All-NBA team nine times and voted to the All-Star game nine times.

Payton was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame this year. During his acceptance speech, the Oakland native bragged that he was the best trash talker in the history of the NBA.

Payton talked a good game, but he backed up his bravado with plenty of skill. Defense was his calling card, and he’s considered one of the best lock-down perimeter defenders the game has ever seen.

OneManFastBreak.net ranks the 10 best perimeter defenders in NBA history:

10) Michael Cooper – Larry Bird paid Cooper the highest compliment when he called him the tougher defender he has ever played against. That’s high praise coming for Larry Legend. Cooper possessed the perfect body and mindset to be a great defender: lean and mean. He made the NBA All-Defensive First Team five times, and named NBA Defensive Player of the Year in 1986-87 season.

9) LeBron James – The only reason why LeBron isn’t ranked higher on this list is because he’s far from finished. James is one of the few people in the world who can defend all five positions. LeBron’s power, speed, and agility allows him to cover so much ground. Since joining the Miami Heat, LeBron’s defense has gone from good to great. He could have easily been named defensive player of the year in 2012-13. It’ll just be a matter of time.

LeBron James was named to the NBA All-Defensive First Team in 2012-13. (GETTY IMAGES)

8) Joe Dumars – The great Michael Jordan calls Dumars the best defender he’s ever gone up against. Along with Dennis Rodman, Joe D was the cornerstone of Chuck Daly’s “Jordan Rules” defensive playbook that powered the Detroit Pistons to back-to-back NBA titles. The scheme ultimately forced the Chicago Bulls to alter their game plan and feature other players on the court so defenders can’t load up on Jordan.

7) Ron Artest – Whether he’s Ron Artest or Metta World Peace, the 6-7, 250-pound bully from Queensbridge, N.Y., is a feared defender because he’s flat-out crazy. Crazy in a good way. Artest is blessed with strong hands, and he knows how to use them. Artest is extremely physical and no guard or forward in the world could back him down. His on-court antics sometimes borders on lunacy, but you’d want Artest on your side when there’s a brawl.

6) Alvin Robertson – Defense was Robertson’s forte, and defense was the reason why Bobby Knight invited him to the 1984 Olympic Trials. Robertson earned a spot on the squad — a team that featured Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, and Chris Mullin — and won a gold medal in Los Angeles. Robertson was the 1985-86 defensive player of the year, leading the league that season with 3.7 steals per game. He amassed 2,112 steals for his career.

5) Kobe Bryant – About the only void in Kobe’s brilliant and soon to be Hall-of-Fame career is that he never won defensive player of the year. But that’s not his fault. Voters tend to favor big men, as only seven non-centers have won defensive player of the year. Bryant will go down in history as one of the best on-ball defenders the league has ever seen. He is such an offensive genius that his man-to-man skills sometimes gets overshadowed. Kobe has been named to the all-defensive first team nine times.

Kobe Bryant is a nine-time member of the NBA all-defensive team. (GETTY IMAGES)

4) SIDNEY MONCRIEF — During the 1980s, there were plenty of top perimeter defenders in the league – such as Michael Cooper, Alvin Robertson and Joe Dumars – but Moncrief was regarded as one of the best at his position. The former Milwaukee Bucks star was the first to receive the defensive player of the year award, winning it 1982-83 and again in 1983-84, and his effort and energy powered the Bucks to the third-best winning percentage in the ’80s behind only the Lakers and Celtics. “When you play against Moncrief, you’re in for a night of all-around basketball,” Michael Jordan said. “He’ll hound you everywhere you go, both ends of the court. You just expect it.”

3) GARY PAYTON — The Glove won defensive player of the year in 1996 and amassed 2,445 steals during his 17-year NBA career that included stints in Seattle, Milwaukee, L.A., Boston and Miami. At 6-4, Payton could cover point guards as well as shooting guards, and his trash talking was second to none. GP loved to get in his opponent’s head with incessant dialogue, and it wasn’t always playful. Payton credits former Seattle Sonics assistant coach Tim Grgurich for turning him loose on the defensive end. Grgurich, who worked under Hall-of-Fame coach Jerry Tarkanian, gave Payton more freedom and allowed him to wreak havoc. With Payton and Nate McMillan hounding you in the backcourt, the Sonics were no walk in the park.

2) MICHAEL JORDAN — Jordan is regarded as one of the greatest — if not the best — offensive players in basketball history, but his defense was just as good. He could have easily been the No. 1 player on this list. Jordan took great pride in shutting down his man, making him the gold standard in terms of being a two-way player. He never backed down from a challenge, and he often volunteered to guard the other team’s best player. Jordan was named defensive player of the year in 1987-88 and made first-team all-defense nine times. If there was one chink on Jordan’s armor — and this is a total nitpick — he occasionally gambled on the defensive end and left the back end vulnerable to backdoor cuts and dribble penetration. And he also got away with more fouls because of his legendary reputation, as referees tend to swallow their whistles when Jordan pushed up on his man.

Michael Jordan was the unquestioned leader of the Chicago Bulls, but teammate Scottie Pippen often carried the heavier load on defense. (GETTY IMAGES)

1) SCOTTIE PIPPEN — Phil Jackson calls Scottie Pippen one of the smartest defensive players he has ever coach. This is tall praise from a man who coached Michael Jordan and Dennis Rodman. Pippen disrupted many offensive plans with his quickness, length and incredible instincts. He was named to the all-defensive first team eight times and amassed 2,307 steals. During the 1991 NBA Finals, Pippen flipped the series around when he suffocated Magic Johnson in Game 2 and made it extremely difficult for the Lakers to get into their offensive sets. Pippen started the game on James Worthy and when Jordan picked up two pick fouls, Phil Jackson switched Pippen on Magic and the series took a stunning turn in favor of the Bulls. In the 1998 Eastern Conference finals against the Indiana Pacers Pippen smothered Mark Jackson from end-to-end, disrupting Indiana’s attack and forcing coach Larry Bird to turn to the quicker Travis Best. Jordan earned a reputation for being a shutdown perimeter defender, but when you break it all down Pippen was the quarterback of the Bulls on defense.

Joel Huerto is editor and publisher of OneManFastBreak.net. Follow him on Twitter @onemanfastbreak.