HE FITS THE BILL ... AGAIN EX-LAKERS COACH SHARMAN TO ENTER HALL FOR 2ND TIME.

Byline: Ross Siler Staff Writer

The name on the outside of the Lincoln Boulevard hotel changed a couple of years ago from the Airport Marina to the Furama. The banners hanging from a second-story balcony now advertise student housing and a weekly comedy night at the bar.

Every so often, though, Bill Sharman finds his way inside. The booth he shared in the hotel restaurant with Wilt Chamberlain more than 30 years ago is gone but Sharman still can point out the spot where basketball history took place.

It was late in the summer of 1971. Sharman was two weeks from beginning his first training camp as Lakers coach and Chamberlain arrived for lunch in a Rolls-Royce convertible.

On Friday, Sharman will be re-enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., joining John Wooden and Lenny Wilkens as the only men to be inducted as both a player and coach.

On that 1971 afternoon, however, Sharman was trying to sell Chamberlain the one thing he needed less than elevator shoes - the morning shootaround. To make matters worse, Sharman couldn't even pay for lunch, having left his wallet at the Forum.

The significance of the meeting would not come to Sharman until later, though he has no doubt about it now.

``If (Wilt and I) didn't get off to a good start,'' Sharman said, ``maybe none of the teams would be having a morning shootaround today. It turned out to be a much bigger event than I thought about at the time.''

So Sharman pitched his case for practicing at 11 a.m. on the day of games and Chamberlain listened quietly. It was no secret Chamberlain kept the NBA's latest hours and lived the league's most prodigious life.

What Sharman was asking for amounted to a religious conversion from Chamberlain. But the coach could call on a friendship with the center dating to a youth camp Sharman once ran in Boston. Finally, it was Chamberlain's turn to speak.

`` 'You know we've been friends,' '' Sharman recalled Chamberlain as saying. `` 'You know I don't like to get up early in the morning. But I'll go along with it and we'll try it, and if I think it will help the team, I'll do it.' ''

Thirty-three consecutive victories later, the shootaround was still around. The Lakers went two months without losing a game, Chamberlain missed two morning practices all season and the franchise captured its first championship in Los Angeles.

As for the restaurant bill, it never came: The manager recognized Chamberlain and took care of it himself. And Sharman, a nervous wreck throughout the meal, never got to say thank you.

``I walk back in that restaurant and I look at where we were sitting,'' Sharman said. ``I never saw that same manager again, but if he knew what he did. ... I'd like to tell him that story.''

There won't be enough time Friday for Sharman to tie together all the threads from 53 years in pro basketball. He was Bob Cousy's backcourt mate with the Boston Celtics, won championships in three different leagues as a coach, and still works at age 78 as a Lakers special consultant.

But he will start by thanking the three men who will introduce him at the enshrinement ceremony: Cousy, Wooden and Jerry West. He also will thank every player he coached and apologize to the ones he wished he could have given more playing time.

He will pay special tribute to his wife, Joyce, who spoke for him after his voice all but disappeared in the 1980s. And if any of the five minutes allowed for his induction speech is left, Sharman might make mention of that restaurant manager.

``I've been thinking about what I'm going to say and I can't think of any words to describe it,'' said Sharman, who was inducted as a player in 1976. ``It's just such a great, great honor.''

It will be a humbling moment for Sharman, 28 years removed from coaching his last game, to travel from his home on a quiet street in Playa del Rey to take his place alongside Wooden and Wilkens.

``Maybe it's a little bit later than it could have been,'' former Lakers great Gail Goodrich said. ``But he's finally getting that recognition.''

Sharman came into the NBA when players roomed together and washed their own uniforms. Now he watches $100 million superstars from his seat at Staples Center, still writing reports for Jerry Buss and Mitch Kupchak.

His impact on the game was indisputable. ``If Bill Sharman isn't in the Hall of Fame as a coach,'' Wooden wrote in a recommendation letter, ``no one should be.''

In addition to the shootaround, Sharman was the first Lakers coach to show film, even though the broken-down projector he used was held in place by a pencil. He also made K.C. Jones the Lakers' first assistant coach, over some objections from owner Jack Kent Cooke.

`` `Why would you need an assistant?' '' Sharman said Cooke asked him. `` `You only have 12 players. I have 50 people working for me and I don't need an assistant.' ''

His first two titles came with the ABL's Cleveland Pipers and ABA's Utah Stars. But Sharman is best remembered for his work with the 1971-72 Lakers, a team thought to be too old with too much attitude when he took over.

But Sharman was the perfect fit. He let the Lakers run the same way Red Auerbach did in Boston, averaging nearly 121 points per game. He persuaded Chamberlain to play more like Bill Russell and found a player willing to do everything he asked in West.

``I always say he was the easiest coach I ever played for in that he told you what he wanted and demanded of you and that was it,'' West said. ``He was a tremendous competitor as a player but as a coach he was more reserved.''

Most importantly, Sharman knew how to make the game fun. His style was proof, Jones said, that superstar players can make great coaches.

He had Chamberlain launching jumpers with Flynn Robinson during shootaround, laughing with each one. And Sharman created a game within the game on the court, doling out $5 bonuses for steals and blocked shots and issuing $5 fines for missed box outs and turnovers.

``Wilt was a big winner,'' Sharman said. ``He loved it because he blocked a lot of shots and that was a plus.''

Before the end of December, the Lakers were sipping champagne in the locker room, having broken the NBA's previous record for consecutive victories. There was more to come after a 69-13 regular season and an NBA Finals victory in five games over New York.

``I think the biggest thing in this league is there's a right coach for the right team and the right personnel,'' West said, ``and Bill was certainly the right coach for us.''

But there also was a price Sharman was paying. His players noticed it sometime during Sharman's first season. Their coach slowly was losing his voice, like a handful of sand slipping through his fingers.

After the Lakers won the championship in 1972, Sharman received an invitation to appear with Johnny Carson on ``The Tonight Show.'' Instead, he turned it and all other appearances down and headed to Hawaii for two weeks to rest his voice.

It never fully returned. The diagnosis originally was laryngitis, then spastic dysphonia. Sharman tried using a megaphone to run practice. But by the end of the 1975-76 season, he had to step down. His contract had expired and his voice was gone.

``It got to the point where I could force it,'' Sharman said. ``I could talk a little. But everybody kept saying, 'You shouldn't talk, you shouldn't talk.' ''

His voice reduced to a whisper at age 50, when Sharman replaced Pete Newell as the Lakers' general manager. West replaced Sharman as coach, with ample regrets.

``I've looked back on my life,'' West said, ``and I feel horrible that I took his job because of some physical problem.''

Those problems only got worse when Sharman had one of his vocal cords crushed in the 1980s. It was believed to be the best treatment then but ended up doing irreparable damage instead.

When he stepped down as Lakers president in 1988, Sharman's condition had deteriorated such that doctors told him to rest his voice for one year. At home, Sharman and his wife communicated by writing notes to each other on a chalkboard.

Come Friday night, however, Sharman will give a speech dictated entirely by how much time ESPN Classic gives him. Thanks to a series of specialists, his voice now is as good as the stories he tells.

``When we got married, he talked very well, certainly well enough to say, 'I do,' '' Joyce Sharman said with a laugh. ``It's a big excitement to have it come full circle like that.''

Even Sharman admits, though, that recognition sometimes has been slow to come his way. He has shied away from television and radio interviews and has a low public profile as a result.

``Most people know about the 33-game streak,'' Sharman said, ``but a lot of people don't know about the ABA or ABL.''

The re-enshrinement will afford Sharman a step back into the spotlight. He was nominated by Lakers officials John Black and Blain Skinner after a round of golf one afternoon. Until then, nobody had realized Sharman could be inducted a second time.

It took another two years before Sharman was elected in April, chosen from a group of finalists that included Jim Calhoun and Gene Keady. The class will be headlined by Clyde Drexler but the jokes will be best about Sharman.

``Bob Cousy's saying we can get Billy in there for the third time maybe for being the oldest,'' Joyce Sharman said.

As of last week, 58 family members and friends were planning to attend the ceremonies, with a celebration dinner set for Saturday at the Sheraton. Sharman and his wife will be the hosts and the best stories about the Celtics and Lakers will be told again.

The only thing missing will be Chamberlain at the table and a manager willing to pick up the check at the end of the night.

Ross Siler, [phone]

ross.siler(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

3 photos, 2 boxes

Photo:

(1 -- color) Former Lakers coach Bill Sharman, who already is in the Basketball Hall of Fame as a player, will be inducted as a coach Friday.

Tom Mendoza/Staff Photographer

(2) no caption (Sharman talking to player)

(3) no caption (``Project Basketball'' book cover)

Box:

(1) SHARMAN'S COACHING CAREER

(2) TWICE AS NICE