The Los Angeles Lakers All-Time Roster: Starting Five, Bench and Coach

Who Are The All-Time Lakers?

Just to set the table, we’re picking our all-time Lakers based on what they did in a Lakers uniform for the most part. The rest of their careers come into play, but in a tiebreaker, the Lakers portion of a player’s career counts more.

We’re going to start with a starting five, including a three-man backcourt of all-time greats who spent their entire careers with the franchise.

The title of greatest Laker ever often comes down to two of these three: Kobe Bryant and Magic Johnson. Both spent their entire careers with the franchise, contributing to five NBA title runs.

Bryant was an 18-time All-Star in his 20-year career, earning one NBA MVP award, two Finals MVP awards, and 11 selections to the All-NBA first team. He is the all-time leading scorer in Lakers history. He has the second-highest single-game point total in a regular-season game in league history, scoring 81 against Toronto in 2006.

Johnson was the No. 1 overall pick of the 1979 NBA Draft, leading the Lakers to the NBA title in his rookie season and earning NBA Finals MVP honors. Johnson won two other NBA Finals MVPs and league MVP three times. He was a 12-time All-Star over his 13 seasons in the NBA and is the NBA’s all-time leader in assists per game in the regular season (11.19) and the playoffs (12.35).

No list of the LA Lakers all-time players would be complete without Mr. Clutch, Jerry West. The man who became the NBA logo was a great scorer who helped the Lakers to nine Finals appearances, though most were against the Boston Celtics dynasty of the 1960s. West is the only Finals MVP from a losing team, earning it after a seven-game Finals loss to Boston in 1969. West was a 10-time All-NBA first-team selection and became the franchise’s head coach and general manager, helping to put together the three-peat championship run in the early 2000s.

We’re cheating a bit on the front line of the Lakers’ all-time starting 5 because the center position is so stacked. Four of the greatest centers of all time have played for the franchise, so we’re picking two for our starting five.

Shaquille O’Neal had a dominant run with the Lakers in the 1990s and 2000s, earning NBA Finals MVP honors in each of the team’s championships from 2000 to 2002. O’Neal was also league MVP in 1999-2000 after leading the NBA in scoring and was an All-Star selection in every season he was with the franchise.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was one of the most dominant big men in NBA history and one of the Lakers’ greatest players. Abdul-Jabbar won three of his six league MVP honors with the Lakers and teamed with Johnson for five NBA titles with the franchise. The “Captain” had one of the most unstoppable shots in league history with his skyhook. He was also an anchor on the defensive end, leading the league in blocks four times with the franchise.

All-Time Greats On All-Time Lakers Bench

How great is the Lakers franchise history? The NBA’s all-time leading scorer would be coming off our bench for the Los Angeles Lakers’ all-time roster.

LeBron James is one of the game’s all-time greats, but much of his career came with other franchises. He has an NBA Finals MVP award for his Lakers career after taking Los Angeles to the title in 2020, and he continues to set career marks as he approaches his 40th birthday.

Pau Gasol also only spent part of his NBA career with the Lakers, but his time with the franchise included being the second-best player on back-to-back title teams. He teamed with Bryant to take the Lakers to three straight NBA Finals appearances, winning the championship in 2009 and 2010.

The Showtime Era of the Lakers franchise had one of the greatest lineups in the team’s history. Included in that was James Worthy, who was a consistent scorer and recipient of many Johnson passes on the fast break. “Big Game James” came through in the 1988 NBA Finals, earning MVP honors when the Lakers topped the Detroit Pistons in seven games for the title.

Another member of the 1980s run of five titles in the decade was guard Michael Cooper, who was just inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2024. The third-round pick in the 1978 draft, Cooper became a valuable part of the Lakers dynasty of the 1980s, earning first-team All-Defensive honors five times and winning NBA Defensive Player of the Year in 1987.

Although he wasn’t in the Lakers’ 2000 starting lineup, Derek Fisher was a valuable member of the three-peat champions. He then returned to Los Angeles to be a part of the back-to-back title teams in 2009 and 2010. A clutch 3-point shooter and defender, Fisher made big-time shots throughout his Lakers career, earning him a spot on this roster.

George Mikan, the original dominant big man, deserves a spot on this team. In the 1940s and 1950s, Mikan played for the then-Minneapolis Lakers and led the franchise to its first four NBA titles.

Another big man who is always mentioned among the game’s greats is Wilt Chamberlain. He spent the last five seasons of his Hall of Fame career with the Lakers. Chamberlain teamed with West to lead the Lakers to their first NBA title in Los Angeles in 1972.

We must mention a few more players who missed being included among the all-time Lakers, including Elgin Baylor, Robert Horry, Byron Scott, Anthony Davis, Norm Nixon, and AC Green.

The Greatest To Coach The Lakers

The list of the best Lakers coaches isn’t very long, to be honest. With this much talent in the franchise’s history, it’s almost like we’re ranking Lakers’ head coaches since 1980, as the two most successful coaches have been Phil Jackson and Pat Riley.

Jackson had two stints as the franchise’s head coach, winning five titles in the 2000s. Jackson also won six titles with the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s, creating his legend. He earned another three-peat with O’Neal and Bryant and then won back-to-back titles with Bryant and Gasol.

But for our money, Riley earns the title of the greatest of the LA Lakers coaches. Riley took over midway through the 1981-82 season and pushed the team to a title. Riley created the Showtime era, emphasizing the fast break and defense. Under Riley, who also played for the Lakers in the 1970s, Los Angeles became the first team to win a title at the Boston Garden, which was the first time the franchise defeated the Celtics in the Finals.

Riley also guaranteed a back-to-back title after winning the 1987 title in an era when teams never repeated. The 1987-88 team became the first repeat champion in the NBA since 1968-69.

So there it is: our Lakers’ all-time roster and coach. We know you’ll disagree somewhat with our choices, but that’s okay. One of the greatest franchises in NBA history has so many options for an all-time team that it’s hard to get everyone to agree.