Did Wilt Chamberlain’s unconventional head-coaching stint from afar lead to legal trouble with the Los Angeles Lakers?

The Los Angeles Lakers sued Wilt Chamberlain for one of the most bizarre “long distance” head-coaching assignments ever.

Wilt Chamberlain was signed as both a coach and a player, but he never showed up for any of the practices while holding the head coaching job.

With his notoriety and influence outside of the court, the late great Wilt Chamberlain became one of the most dominant players in NBA history and a divisive personality who went beyond the game of basketball. Though there are many amazing anecdotes about Wilt and his many pursuits, one particularly noteworthy one is when he made the decision to become a coach while still a member of the Los Angeles Lakers. Wilt always did things his way. That’s not all that shocking, but in Wilt’s instance, his “long-distance” coaching style garnered notice in addition to the fact that he insulted the team’s starting center by calling him a “fat pig.”

Wilt aspired to be a Conquistadors player and coach. Many things may be said about Wilt Chamberlain and his illustrious NBA career, but for the purposes of this discussion, we’ll focus on his brief tenure as the San Diego Conquistadors’ head coach. At the conclusion of his brilliant career as a Los Angeles Lakers player in 1973, Wilt made the decision to try something different in his life and took a position with the ABA team Conquistadors. That one choice alone created a great deal of commotion and was unquestionably one of the worst coaching appointments in NBA/ABA history.

Wilt agreed to a $600,000 deal to join the Conquistadors as a coach and player, but he never dressed for a game and never made the journey to San Diego to be a member of the team. Wilt’s careless actions quickly led the Lakers to pursue legal action against him. In a press conference announcing his new coaching role, Wilt even mentioned that Jerry West was considering a reunion with the franchise. Wilt claims that this was due to some contractual disputes West was having with the Lakers; you might say that this was the final straw that led the Lakers to decide to sue Wilt.

Interestingly enough, the court ruled in the Lakers’ favor stating Wilt can’t play basketball for any other team other than the Lakers; however, they also ruled he could coach The Conquistadors. Wilt then decided to give most of the coaching duties to his assistant Stan Albeck who said Wilt had an excellent feel for the game but was impatient with the daily working hours a coach has to put in to be great at his job. On top of that, Albeck remembers Wilt was sometimes more focused on his own personal things rather than actually coaching the team.

Wilt called the starting center a fat pig, insulting him. Wilt conducted remote coaching from his opulent Bel-Air estate, without even bothering to relocate to San Diego. Wilt’s major priorities were ladies, signings, and living the life of a celebrity; coaching was just something he wanted to do on the side.

There were times when Wilt would indeed show up for the coach’s game; nevertheless, he would frequently be seated near the sidelines with women in tow. The team’s starting center Genee Moore took exception at it and informed the media that he overheard Wilt call someone’s astrological sign “The dollar sign” when she inquired about it.