Portrayal of Jerry West in HBO’s ‘Winning Time’ sparks criticism – The Athletic

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Gary Vitti spent two days last year as an actor and in-house expert on the set of “Winning Time.”

That was enough.

When those two days ended, producers offered to hire the longtime Lakers athletic trainer for another three days of work on the HBO series that chronicles the 1980s Lakers dynasty.

He declined.

“I said I don’t want to be a part of this,” Vitti told The Athletic.

He said he left about $15,000 on the table by walking away from the project, a move that helps underscore the angst over the series among people who were part of the Showtime Lakers era. “Winning Time,” which will have a 10-episode run, debuted on Sunday and was seen by approximately 900,000 viewers across all HBO platforms.

It is a dramatized account, but one that is based on author Jeff Pearlman’s 2014 bestseller “Showtime,” a heavily-researched work of nonfiction. So while the backbone of the show is based on real events, it offers plenty of embellishments.

For people who were around the Lakers in the early ’80s, those might include minor details like Jerry West’s office not having a window for him to throw a trophy through — which happens in the pilot episode — or then-Lakers general manager Bill Sharman speaking in a full voice when in reality a vocal cord injury meant he spoke barely above a whisper. In the show, owner Dr. Jerry Buss negotiates a job with the Lakers for his daughter, Jeanie, in 1979, when she would have been 17.

In real life, Jeanie Buss, now the team’s governor and top executive, didn’t get hired by her dad until 1981, and even then it was to run the Los Angeles Strings of World Team Tennis. She wasn’t hired by the Lakers until 1995.

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