|
In basketball, Showtime was an era in Los Angeles Lakers history when the National Basketball Association (NBA) team played an exciting run-and-gun style of basketball. Led by Magic Johnson's passing skills and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's scoring, the team relied on fast breaks and won five NBA championships. Lakers owner Jerry Buss purchased the team in 1979, and he wanted their games to be entertaining. He insisted that the Lakers play an up-tempo style, and the team hired dancers and a live band for their home games at The Forum. The team established a Hollywood-celebrity following. ==Background== Lakers owner Jack Kent Cooke in 1979 was in the process of selling the team to Jerry Buss. Possessing the first overall pick in the upcoming 1979 NBA Draft, the Lakers narrowed their choice to either Magic Johnson or Sidney Moncrief. Los Angeles already had a fine point guard in Norm Nixon, making Moncrief potentially a wonderful complement at off guard. However, Cooke liked Johnson's smile and playing style. In one of Cooke's last acts as Lakers owner, the Lakers drafted the point guard Johnson. Buss wanted Lakers games to be entertaining. In the 1960s, Buss was a regular at The Horn, a nightclub in Santa Monica, California that attracted an upscale clientele. Buss loved the excitement of the club's famous opening act, which included a dimming of the lights followed by a dramatic singing of the their signature tune, "It's Showtime". After he purchased the Lakers and The Forum from Cooke, Buss embarked on creating a grand-scale version of The Horn.〔Ostler, Springer 1988, p.225.〕 Like a night club act, he believed a basketball game should be entertaining.〔 Buss sought to match the excitement of college basketball games between the USC Trojans and the UCLA Bruins during John Wooden's era. The owner insisted the Lakers have a running game. After Jerry West had retired as Lakers head coach, and the team failed to recruit Jerry Tarkanian of the UNLV Runnin' Rebels, Buss hired Jack McKinney to install a running offense.〔Ostler, Springer 1988, pp. 104–7.〕 In Buss' opinion, a theatrical atmosphere paired with the running game would excite the fans and strengthen the Lakers' home-court advantage.〔Ostler, Springer 1988, p.245.〕 He wanted to create a Hollywood atmosphere that would be embraced by the Los Angeles culture even if it was hated by the rest of the country. Buss borrowed the term ''Showtime'' from The Horn to describe the Lakers' approach to basketball, and it was embraced by Lakers fans and the Los Angeles media.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Showtime (basketball)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|