Bob Lanier, who as a middle for the Detroit Pistons and Milwaukee Bucks in the 1970s and ’80s parlayed a deft left-handed hook shot, a gentle midrange jumper and strong rebounding expertise into a Hall of Fame profession, died on Tuesday in Phoenix. He was 73.
The N.B.A. mentioned he died after a brief sickness however offered no different particulars.
Lanier, who stood 6-foot-11 and weighed about 250 kilos, excelled in an period of dominant facilities like Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Nate Thurmond and Wes (*73*).
“Guys didn’t change teams as much, so when you were facing the Bulls or the Bucks or New York, you had all these rivalries,” he instructed NBA.com in 2018. “Lanier against Jabbar! Jabbar against Willis Reed! And then Chamberlain and Artis Gilmore and Bill Walton! You had all these great big men, and the game was played from inside out.”
He added: “It was a rougher game, a much more physical game that we played in the ’70s. You could steer people with elbows. They started cutting down on the number of fights by fining people more. Oh, it was a rough ’n’ tumble game.”
As a Pistons rookie in the 1970-71 season, Lanier shared time at middle with Otto Moore. In his second season, as a full-time starter, he averaged 25.7 factors and 14.2 rebounds a sport, placing him in the league’s high 10 in each classes.
“He understood the small nuances of the game,” Dave Bing, a Pistons teammate and fellow Hall of Famer, mentioned in a video biography of Lanier proven on Fox Sports Detroit in 2012. “He could shoot the 18-to-20-footer as well as any guard. He had a hook shoot — nobody but Kareem had a hook shot like him. He could do anything he wanted to do.”
Lanier wore what have been believed to be measurement 22 sneakers. In 1989, nonetheless, a consultant of Converse disputed that notion, saying that they have been actually measurement 18 ½. Whatever their precise measurement, a pair of Lanier’s sneakers, bronzed, is in the assortment of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.
During 9 full seasons with the Pistons, Lanier performed in seven All-Star Games. He was elected most useful participant of the 1974 All-Star Game, wherein he led all scorers with 24 factors.
But the Pistons had solely 4 successful seasons throughout his time with the group and by no means superior very far in the playoffs. The roster was typically in flux. Coaches got here and went. Lanier handled knee accidents and different bodily setbacks.
“It was like a life unfulfilled,” he instructed Fox Sports Detroit.
In early 1980, with the Pistons’ file at 14-40, the group traded Lanier to the Milwaukee Bucks for a youthful middle, Kent Benson, and a first-round 1980 draft choose. Frustrated by the Pistons’ lack of success, Lanier had requested to be despatched to a playoff contender.
“I’m kind of relieved, but I’m kind of sad, too,” he instructed The Detroit Free Press. “I’ve got a lot of good memories of Detroit.”
Lanier averaged 22.7 factors and 11.8 rebounds a sport with the Pistons.
Robert Jerry Lanier Jr. was born on Sept. 10, 1948, in Buffalo to Robert and Nannie Lanier. Young Bob was 6-foot-5 by the time he was a sophomore in highschool, and he performed nicely sufficient there to be wooed by dozens of schools. He selected St. Bonaventure University in upstate Allegany, N.Y.
He was a sensation there, averaging 27.6 factors and 15.7 rebounds over three seasons.
In 1970, the Bonnies defeated Villanova to win the East Regional finals of the N.C.A.A. males’s basketball event, sending them to the Final Four. But Lanier injured his knee throughout the sport, forcing the Bonnies to face Jacksonville in the nationwide semifinal sport with out him. St. Bonaventure misplaced, 91-83.
“I didn’t even know at the time I tore my knee up,” Lanier instructed The Buffalo News in 2007. “But when I ran back down the court and tried to pivot, my leg collapsed. I didn’t know at the time I had torn my M.C.L.”
Lanier was nonetheless recuperating from knee surgical procedure when the Pistons selected him No. 1 general in the N.B.A. draft; he was additionally chosen No. 1 by the New York (now Brooklyn) Nets of the American Basketball Association. He shortly signed with Detroit.
Although he had statistically higher years with the Pistons, Lanier loved extra group success with the Bucks (and additionally performed in another All-Star Game). Under Coach Don Nelson, the Bucks gained 60 video games throughout the 1980-81 season, and they superior to the Eastern Conference finals in 1982-83 and 1983-84.
Lanier was additionally president of the gamers’ union, the National Basketball Players Association, and helped negotiate a collective bargaining settlement in 1983 that prevented a strike.
Early in the 1983-84 season, his final as a participant, Lanier turned indignant with Bill Laimbeer, the Pistons’ middle, for riling him beneath the boards at the Silverdome in Pontiac, Mich. Lanier retaliated with a left hook that leveled Laimbeer and broke his nostril.
The act not solely earned Lanier a $5,000 wonderful; it additionally delayed the retirement of his No. 16 jersey by the Pistons till 1993. The Bucks retired his quantity in late 1984.
He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1992.
In retirement, he owned a advertising and marketing agency and labored extensively with the N.B.A. as a world ambassador and particular assistant to David Stern, the league’s longtime commissioner, and Adam Silver, his successor. Lanier was additionally an assistant coach beneath Nelson with the Golden State Warriors throughout the 1994-95 season and changed him as interim coach for the last 37 video games of the season after Nelson’s resignation.
Information on survivors was not instantly obtainable.
Lanier mentioned that after he retired, he was much less prone to be acknowledged by the public than when he was a participant. After Shaquille O’Neal, one of the league’s most dominating facilities, got here alongside in the early Nineteen Nineties, individuals figured he will need to have been O’Neal’s father, he instructed NBA.com in 2018.
“‘You’re wearing them big shoes,’” he mentioned individuals would inform him. “I just go along with it. ‘Yeah, I’m Shaq’s dad.’”
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