STU Lantz knows a thing or two about playing second fiddle. He played with some of the great names in NBA history. Lantz has an eye
for talent in the postElvin Hayes. Bob Lanier. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Hall-of-Famers all.
Lantz, a fine player in his own right, always seemed to toil in one or the other's shadow. He averaged 20.6 points a game for the San Diego Rockets in 1970-71. Hayes was lighting it up for 28 a night. The following year, when the team moved to Houston, he averaged 18.5 points a game.
For the past several years, he's been an analyst on Los Angeles Lakers broadcasts, getting his commentary in edgewise while Chick Hearn calls the play-by-play. Another Hall-of-Famer to work with.
It's no surprise, then, that Lantz also is a supporting player in the Pete Newell Big Man Camp, which runs all week at the University of Hawaii. Newell does most of the instruction.
So, Stu, who looks good after the first couple days in Hawaii?
He's quick to answer. Gary Trent of the Portland Trailblazers.
Indeed. Trent, who hasn't yet fulfilled his promise, looks sharp. He's built like the proverbial brick outhouse, yet he knocks down the 15- to 18-foot jumpers as Lantz feeds him passes. "I think he's going to add another element to that team," Lantz says. "Especially with Clifford Robinson being a free agent. It doesn't look like they're going to be able to sign him."
That's probably good news for Trent, who will then be asked to score more.
Lantz knows it sometimes takes a while for a player to develop. "In college you play against a good player once every four or five games," he says. In the pros, of course, everyone can get it done on a regular basis. That's a huge difference. And that's why the players are here. None of them are stars -- yet.
Lantz said he believes Lakers fans will have a lot to cheer about again this season. The pieces are all there to make a run at the Western Conference title, he says. Especially important is having forward Robert Horry in camp from the get-go.
"Having Horry in training camp is a big plus," he says. "That's where all the teaching and the learning takes place."
Lantz said that even though the team is pretty much set, picking up a free agent is always a possibility. He said the Lakers would like to land a player such as Rick Fox, formerly of the Celtics, but he's not sure that's possible, given the salary cap restrictions.
One player in camp who's intimately familiar with salary caps and the market forces at work in the NBA is Jim McIlvaine of the Seattle SuperSonics. He signed a seven-year, $33 million contract with the Sonics last summer and then didn't play as well as the team or its star player, Shawn Kemp, would have liked. By the end of the season, McIlvaine wasn't playing at all. Yesterday, however, McIlvaine proved, at least to me, that he's somewhat generous and a little out of the ordinary.
First, he gave a young camp watcher a pair of his sneakers. They're so big, the kid will be able to water ski in them, but the boy was excited as heck to be getting them from an NBA player.
Moments later, McIlvaine was asked to autograph a couple of cards for another spectator. He asked the young lady how old she was and then replied that since she was 18 she was probably a registered voter. Who is the Speaker of the House in the U.S. Congress? he asked. It took her a while but the woman came up with Newt Gingrich's name.
"Is that required?" I asked, "to answer a civics question before you give an autograph?"
McIlvaine replied, "It could be civics, or math, or science."
Now there's a nice idea. It sure beats hitting the person up for twenty bucks.
