Mannix: Winter deserves Hall of Fame spot

Even though Tex Winter’s career record as an NBA head coach is 51-78, he’s one of the true NBA coaching legends to emerge in the past couple of decades. When Winter took over as the coach of Marquette as a 29-year old in 1951, he was the youngest head coach in major college basketball. By the time he finished his stint as an assistant coach with the Lakers in 2004, the 82-year old Winter was one of basketball’s oldest coaches. 

After a wildly successful college coaching career and a two-year stint as head coach of the Rockets, Winter became an assistant coach in Chicago in 1985. After Phil Jackson was promoted to the head coaching spot in 1989, Winter and Jackson became an unstoppable pair for the better part of the next two decades. Winter taught the Triangle (or triple-post) offense that he’d developed when he was coaching in college to Jackson and the rest of the Bulls. 

The results were and are legendary. Six championships in eight seasons with the Bulls, including two separate three-peats. Another three-peat with the Lakers, bringing Winter’s total of NBA championships to nine. (Winter got a ring for his other thumb when the Lakers voted to give him a ring after their 2009 championship.)

Winter was never the center of attention over the course of his NBA coaching career. All he did was construct the offense that won 10 NBA championships and helped make Phil Jackson the most revered NBA head coach since Red Auerbach. Personally, I think that’s enough to get Winter an admission to the NBA Hall of Fame, and so does Chris Mannix of Sports Illustrated:

There is one honor that continues to elude the man credited as the innovator of the triangle offense: A spot in the Naismith Hall of Fame.

The case against Winter’s election has always been odd, boiling down to the argument that Winter’s greatest impact on the game came not as a player or head coach, but as an assistant, first with the Bulls and later with the Lakers. But even as Hall of Fame voters keep him out, Winter’s peers continue to lobby for him to get in. Michael Jordan singled Winter out during his acceptance speech last year and former Bulls GM Jerry Krause resigned from the Hall of Fame committee because Winter’s name wasn’t on the ballot one year and has sworn never to attend another Hall ceremony until Winter is enshrined…

…At 88, Winter’s coaching career is behind him. His imprint on the game is indelible, but his days on the sideline are probably over. Before the memory of his accomplishments fade, the Hall should rectify one of its most glaring errors.

They should let Tex in.

Tex Winter helped Phil Jackson win 10 championships. He was a big reason that the great Jerry Sloan is still looking for his first championship. Both of those coaches, as well as countless other coaches who had no answer for Winter’s triple-post offense, are or will be Hall of Fame members in time. So are the players who became legends by perfectly running the triangle year after year. If you ask any of those players or coaches, I’m sure they’d put Winter in the Hall in the blink of an eye. It’s time for the Hall voters to recognize that there’s a reason Winter deserves that kind of respect.