“I called an old friend, a genuine certified gangster…”: When Spencer Haywood hired a Mobster to take out the Lakers head coach

Former basketball star Spencer Haywood claims he hired a Detroit mobster to kill the then Los Angeles Laker head coach, Paul Westhead.

The former Olympic star has admitted to plotting the assassination of Westhead with a known gangster.

Nicknamed “The Professor”, Paul Westhead was the head coach for multiple NBA teams and WNBA teams.  He led rookie Magic Johnson and the Lakers to the NBA championship in his first year as a coach.

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Westhead has won championships in both the NBA and the WNBA and is known for his unconventional, run-and-gun style, dubbed “The System.” He has coached the Los Angeles Lakers, Chicago Bulls, Golden State Warriors, and Denver Nuggets, among others.

Haywood played for the Lakers in the 79-80 season winning the only NBA title of his career. Westhead and Haywood clashed during the NBA finals.

Spencer Haywood the former Lakers star admits to plotting the murder of his head coach

Paul Westhead had led the Los Angeles Lakers to the NBA finals during his first season as coach. The Lakers were facing Wilt Chamberlain and the Philadelphia 76ers.

Haywood had passed out during practice following a night of freebasing during the NBA finals. Following an argument with teammates Jim Chones and Brad Holland, Westhead suspended Haywood after Game 3.

“A lot of guys around the league were doing coke, and it was getting rave reviews,” Haywood recalled of his first forays into the drug in 1979. “If you were an NBA player, leeches would line up after the game to stuff coke in your gym bag.”

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In a first-person account of his cocaine addiction, Spencer Haywood claims he hired a Detroit mobster to assassinate Paul Westhead after the then-Los Angeles Lakers coach suspended him during the 1979-80 NBA finals.

“I left the Forum and drove away in my Rolls that night thinking one thought — that Westhead had to die,” Haywood says in an article published in People magazine on June 13.

“In the midst of my rage and the haze of coke, I called an old friend, a genuine certified gangster… We sat down and discussed it. We got Westhead’s address because he lived in Palos Verdes. We’d sabotage his car, mess with his brake lining, and so on “Haywood reflected.

The former Olympic basketball star’s mother, however, persuaded him not to carry out the plot, threatening to turn him in, he wrote in the magazine. Fortunately for Haywood, he was prevented from committing a heinous crime.