Seeking hope from the 1991 Lakers

See if this sounds familiar:

The Lakers, led by a legendary guard, start the season 0-2. A new coach takes over, replacing a legend who won multiple titles but went out in embarrassing fashion in the second round of the playoffs. That legendary guard isn't what he once was, but is still one of the best in the game. The second-best player is probably a bit past his prime but still effective, though he, too, is coming off a disappointing playoff performance. A beloved bench player left town. The new coach preaches a different style, a new offensive system that replaces one that was so well-known - and so dominant - it went by a single word.

That's the 2011-12 Lakers. But it was also the 1991 Lakers. Chances are this season doesn't end like that one, but Lakers fans can at least hope it does, by looking back on how that 1991 season began.

Magic Johnson was the legendary guard, not Kobe Bryant. Mike Dunleavy was the new coach, not Mike Brown. Pat Riley was the legendary coach, not Phil Jackson, and the Lakers lost 4-1 to Phoenix, instead of being swept by Dallas. James Worthy was the second-best player, not Pau Gasol. The beloved bench player who left was Michael Cooper, not Lamar Odom. And Mike Brown has replaced the Triangle, in the same way Dunleavy - and the Lakers' older legs - spelled the end of Showtime.

Like this season, the Lakers started the 1991 campaign on national television, losing 110-99 to San Antonio in a game that's only memorable because it was the first regular season game broadcast on NBC, which had replaced CBS. Hello, John Tesh. The Lakers lost to Portland in overtime in their second game and after a victory, dropped two more to fall to 1-4, inciting panic throughout LA. The Lakers were done. Magic was too old, Dunleavy too dumb, Worthy too horny (he was arrested in Houston early in the year for soliciting a prostitute). The Lakers had picked up Sam Perkins and Terry Teagle in the offseason, but these weren't the '80s Lakers. Portland, which won the West in 1990, becoming the first team other than the Lakers or Houston to win the conference since 1979, was the overwhelming favorite.

But on their way to the graveyard - where they could join other '80s relics like the 76ers, the Rockets and the Celtics - the Lakers turned their season around. They won eight in a row, then, later in the season, ripped off a 16-game winning streak.

The Lakers adapted, making things nice and easy for headline writers who must have scribbled a "From Showtime to Slowtime" line at some point during the season. They could still run on occasion - even today, at 52, Magic could probably lead a break as well as anyone and he certainly could in 1991. But Worthy and Scott had slowed down and Cooper was gone. Instead the Lakers relied on a devastating post-up game. Magic and Worthy could dominate in the paint. Vlade Divac was in his second year and had developed a nifty game, when Magic wasn't yelling at him. And Perkins showed off a back-to-the-basket arsenal few knew he possessed. Four players who could post up at anytime, an advantage that was unmatched in the league. Was it as fun to watch as the 1987 Lakers? Hardly. But it was still highly effective.

Not effective? New addition Terry Teagle. This seems weird to say 20 years later, but I was quite excited when the Lakers signed Teagle before the 1991 season. Teagle. He came with a reputation as a streak scorer, someone who would provide instant offense off the bench. Instead he never found his role, his awkward-looking baseline jumper clanked out more than it fell and not even Magic could turn him into the sixth man they needed.

Still, the Lakers won 58 games and swept Houston in the opening round. The second round featured an entertaining matchup against Golden State, led by Tim Hardaway, Mitch Richmond and Chris Mullin. The Warriors - who played defense then the same way they play it now - stunned the Lakers in the second game and barely lost Game 3. They eventually fell in five but not before Lakers fans had flashbacks to previous playoff flameouts against Phoenix and Houston.

In the Western Conference Finals, the Lakers faced heavily favored Portland. But after stealing the first game and winning Games 3 and 4 with ease in LA, the Lakers held the advantage. Game 6, when LA eliminated Portland, featured Magic's famous clock-killing pass to no one in the final seconds.

The Finals were a dream matchup that year, with everyone finally getting to see Magic vs. Michael, a series people waited years to witness, in the same way everyone's waited for Kobe to face LeBron. Unfortunately, one player - Jordan - was in his athletic prime while the other wasn't quite as dominant as he had been. Again the Lakers stole Game 1, winning it on a Sam Perkins 3-pointer and a Jordan miss at the buzzer - yes, Michael Jordan did not hit every game-winning shot he attempted, no matter what the kids might have heard. The series turned in Game 3, when the Lakers squandered a double-digit advantage in the second half and Jordan drilled a difficult game-tying shot over Vlade in regulation, before sealing the deal in overtime. Two games later, Jordan had his first title. Five months later, Magic retired. It was another decade before the Lakers won another title.

But back to those Finals. I still believe the Lakers would have had a great chance at victory if they'd won Game 3 and taken a 2-1 lead. More importantly, they could have won if James Worthy had not been hobbled by a devastating ankle sprain, which he suffered in Game 5 of the Portland series. The injury robbed Worthy of all his quickness, he was unable to take advantage of Scottie Pippen down low, who famously switched to guarding Magic later in the series. Alas.

The series ended with Worthy and an injured Byron Scott sitting out Game 5. Seven Lakers played that game: Magic, Perkins, Vlade, Teagle, Tony Smith and rookie Elden Campbell. Blech. Yet the Lakers led late. And Magic still managed to dish out a remarkable 20 assists. Twenty assists, while passing to those teammates. For those who sometimes say Magic was made much better by playing with Kareem, Worthy and so many other great players, Game 5 of the 1991 NBA Finals should be offered up as proof that Magic could rack up assists playing next to anyone. The difference, of course, was on the scoreboard.

So now, 21 years later, can the Lakers repeat that performance and pull out one more magical run behind an aging legendary guard? Who knows. In the shorter season, there's less room for error. With Kobe Bryant's injuries racking up on a nightly basis, he's not as dominant as Magic was in 1991. Gasol seems to have lost something - a step or his fire - in a way Worthy had not in 1991. But at 0-2 it's far too soon to bury the Lakers, even if that sounds like someone whose head is buried in the sand. The West isn't what it was a few years ago, when 50-win teams only had the 8 seed. Dallas is in disarray, the Spurs are another year into their fossilization and who knows if Memphis can repeat what it did in 2011. Oklahoma City's the clear favorite, just like Portland was in 1991. The Clippers look like a force (okay, so that is something that's different from '91). If the Lakers can stay relatively healthy and get homecourt at least in the first round of the playoffs, they could do some damage.

And then maybe they'll face the Heat in the Finals, who will take on the role of the Bulls. They'd be younger and hungrier than the old warriors from LA. They'd probably win it in five or six games. LeBron - in his prime, while Kobe is not - would get his first title, just like Jordan won his. It wouldn't be the worst ending for the Lakers.

But first they have to win at least one game in the regular season.

****

A bunch of vids from 1991, including from the invaluable YouTube user non-player zealot. Search 1991 on his page for a bunch more.

A look back at Big Game James

I'm not a conspiracy theory guy. Birthers, Truthers, New World Orders, whatever.

But for awhile I firmly believed that an anti-Laker cabal operated NBA TV's programming. This is a small conspiracy group - our numbers are, well, one. And it's not the type of conspiracy that attracts the attention of Art Bell, Alex Jones or Jesse Ventura. But it affected me. For years - but even more so since the lockout started and NBA TV's programming has consisted of old NBA games, 87 screenings of Teen Wolf, 76 of One on One and 64 of The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh - I watched as the network seemed to only play Lakers losses or Celtics victories. Seemed like every time I turned it on, NBA TV showed Game 4 of the 1984 Finals, or Game 7 from that series or Game 5 of the 1987 ECF or Game 2 of the 1991 Western semis. They showed Lakers collapses and Celtic triumphs.

I wasn't sure who was in charge but I figured they wore green to the office and spoke with an annoying accent.

But a few weeks ago, I flipped to NBA TV and settled in for a long night that celebrated Laker players and victories. Specifically, the network aired Game 7 of the 1988 Western Conference Finals and Game 6 of the NBA Finals, both dramatic LA victories. Plus, a biography of James Worthy's career played before those two games. Hmm, how would this affect my conspiracy theory? Surely it punched holes in my beliefs, and if I actually analyzed the programming I'd realize that I had often seen games from the 1985 NBA Finals or even '87. We'll see. Perhaps I'll accept that there's not anti-Laker bias at the network. Or, like other conspiracy theorists, I'll simply ignore the evidence and bend small pieces of unrelated evidence into a grand theory that re-affirms my warped outlook.

Regardless, that night gave me a chance to watch five hours of James Worthy at his finest. And James Worthy at his finest was strong in the post, fast on the break, quick on the block, efficient on the perimeter, powerful at the rim and practically technically perfect in the paint.

He was the third most-important member of the 1980s Lakers, but while Kareem Abdul-Jabbar towered over the league and Magic Johnson created Showtime, Worthy proved the perfect complement to both and an often-dominant force in his own right. Along with Kareem's sky hook, Worthy's low-post game gave the Lakers an unstoppable inside combination, two options the Lakers always went to whenever someone did slow down the fast break.

Ah, the fast break. Showtime would have existed without Worthy - in fact, it did before the Lakers drafted him with the first pick in 1982 - but it wouldn't have been as effective. And it certainly wouldn't have been as breath-taking.



Worthy came to the Lakers after starring at North Carolina, where he led the Tar Heels to the 1982 national championship. Here's a great video on Worthy's Tar Heels days.



Watching this, you see many of the moves that he later perfected with the Lakers, minus the goggles. And hearing one of the coaches talk, it sounds like Worthy had many of the same moves going all the way back to 8th grade. Probably had the same beard. Strangely, Worthy's freshman year ended when he broke his leg, the same way his rookie year ended with the Lakers in 1983. In the 1982 title game - which ended with Worthy accepting a misguided pass from Georgetown's Fred Brown in the closing seconds - Worthy dominated, hitting 13-for-17 from the floor for 28 points, though he was overshadowed by the winning shot by a freshman named Jordan.

The Lakers drafted Worthy a few weeks after winning the 1982 NBA title, taking advantage of the No. 1 pick through moves that seemed to define the early 1980s, when great teams got even better thanks to bizarre trades with bad teams that always got worse.

For his career, Worthy averaged 17.6 points and shot 52 percent from the floor. That shooting percentage actually dropped quite a bit at the end of his career, when Magic went away, followed by Worthy's knees and quickness. His first eight seasons in the league, Worthy never shot below 54 percent. But Worthy made his reputation in the playoffs - Big Game James did not earn the moniker because of December games against the Kings. In the postseason, Worthy increased his career scoring mark to 21.1 points per game.

Not that Worthy was infallible in the biggest moments. Lakers fans can still picture his pass in Game 2 of the 1984 NBA Finals. The Lakers were up 1-0 in the series against the Celtics and by two in the game. But Worthy's lazy pass - which hung in the air like a Ray Guy punt - never found its target. Gerald Henderson stole it, went in for a layup while Johnny Most's black heart burst with joy, and the Celtics stole the game and eventually the series, also helped along by big missed free throws by Worthy in Game 4. Five years later, in another Game 2, this one against the Pistons, Worthy missed a free throw in the final seconds that could have forced OT, though without Magic and Byron Scott, the free throw likely would have only delayed the inevitable.

But usually Worthy more than lived up to his nickname, and his last name. His greatest moment came in Game 7 of the 1988 NBA Finals, when he scored 36 points, grabbed 16 rebounds and dished out 10 assists as the Lakers survived against the Pistons and became the first repeat champion in 19 years. That performance came against one of the great defensive teams of all time, the Bad Boys. Mahorn, Rodman, Salley, Laimbeer, the Pistons threw everything at Worthy, and he kept throwing everything down.

A year later the Pistons got their revenge as the gods took out Magic and Scott's hamstrings. The undermanned Lakers - Kareem was on his last legs, in his last games, and David Rivers and Tony Campbell had prominent roles - lost in four, even though they led in the fourth quarter of the final three games. The final game, however, saw Worthy again at the top of his game. He finished with 40 points. It's one of his most underrated performances, lost in the defeat and in his own Game 7 effort from two years earlier. But everything in the Worthy arsenal was on display.

Here's the first quarter from that game. It's a long video. Worth it.



At one point Worthy hits eight straight shots, again against one of the best defenses in league history. It's a unique mixture of power and finesse, aggressiveness and patience. If you want to fast-forward a bit, go to the six-minute mark - that's when Worthy hits his first shot and then a brawl nearly breaks out after Mahorn flattens Michael Cooper.

Worthy's real explosion begins at the 14-minute mark: Jumper from just inside the 3-point line; up-and-under fake, back with the left hand; fearless drive to hoop for finger roll; turnaround jumper on post; 15-foot jumper; monster dunk off the break (great no-call on a possible charge on Coop); 17-foot jumper.

Worthy put on those types of displays throughout his career. Hakeem Olajuwon and Kevin McHale were generally regarded as the two post players with the best moves down low during that era, but Worthy wasn't far behind. He possessed the full array, moves he perfected and practically patented. When he faced the basket and a defender, he was equally comfortable going left or right. A drive to the right often brought a finger-roll. To the left he could explode to the basket for a dunk. He'd hold the ball for a few seconds, staring into the defender's eyes. He'd do a bit of an Ali shuffle and then make his move, when he wasn't simply pulling up for a better-than-you-think jumper.

When he pump-faked inside, Worthy used both arms, his head and nearly his entire upper body to sell the move. Defenders might not bite on the first or even the second, but he'd do it until they did and finish it off with a finger-roll. He could spin off a defender the second he caught a pass with his back to the basket and roll in for a dunk. Or he could simply nail a turnaround jumper, spinning to the baseline or the paint.

But the reason Worthy's low-post brilliance doesn't resonate quite as much is because the enduring image of the 6-9 forward is of him swooping from the lane for a dunk on a Lakers fast break. He might have been the best finisher in NBA history, able to glide in for a layup or power in for a dunk. When Magic grabbed the ball Worthy ran down the court like a 100-meter sprinter, looking up once he crossed halfcourt, just waiting for the moment when Magic would deliver a no-look pass.

Worthy's dunks almost always looked the same. Right arm fully extended, it seemed like all he had to do was flick his wrist at the rim.



People occasionally debate just how good Worthy would have been if he hadn't played with the Lakers, specifically with Magic. It seems people have that discussion about Worthy more than they do about any other Hall of Famer. Worthy's numbers - especially his shooting percentage - did drop when Magic retired. But the years he spent running full speed while Magic played contributed to his decline once Magic left. His knees finally gave out. Physically he was nowhere near the same player, meaning the easy baskets didn't come like they once did. He still could dominate down low. And he showed in those '89 Finals - when Magic played about a game and a half - that he would have been able to score no matter who was at point.

Worthy wasn't a great ball-handler and he was never a shutdown defender, although he did a good job of harassing Larry Bird in both the 1985 and '87 Finals. Plus, one of the most famous plays of his career - the steal in Game 6 of the '87 Finals - came on the defensive end. But he was the perfect offensive weapon for the Showtime Lakers, sleek, dangerous, a cruise missile flying down the Forum's court, launched by order of Pat Riley and controlled by Magic Johnson.

In Worthy's final Finals appearance, he limped along in a way that foreshadowed his final seasons. Worthy suffered a severe ankle sprain in Game 5 of the WCF against Portland. He managed to play as the Lakers clinched in six. But against the Bulls, Worthy staggered along, robbed of all his quickness. Each time he scored, he labored back. There were no fast-break dunks, few classic Worthy finishes in the paint. People said Scottie Pippen got the best of him, but that was only because Worthy was on one leg. Yet he still averaged 19 a game, before finally sitting out the decisive Game 5.

If he'd been healthy...I tell myself the Lakers might have pulled it off. They would have won a sixth title since 1980, would have delayed the Bulls dynasty a year. And 20 years later, NBA TV would have replayed the Lakers' victory in the 1991 NBA Finals.

Or not replayed it.

Magic's 1996 comeback: Not a complete disaster

If I had to make a list of iconic images from Magic Johnson's career, I'd come up with the familiar ones known to Lakers everywhere: mauling Kareem after The Captain's game-winning hook in Magic's first game as a pro; the hug after Magic's 42-point performance in Game 6 of the 1980 NBA Finals; the bullet pass to Worthy for a dunk in Game 6 at the Boston Garden in 1985; the no-look, behind-the-head pass to Worthy against Golden State; the junior, junior skyhook; flinging the ball downcourt against Portland.

All of those moments took place between 1979 and 1991. I could probably list 200 moments and games before I'd ever list one that happened during the 1996 season. The comeback. Like many Lakers fans, I've ignored details from Magic's 1996 return to the game, treating it the way De Niro fans must treat the last 10 years of his career. It was the year after the Lakers' surprising run in the 1995 playoffs and the year before the Shaq-Kobe era began. It was a pretty young team whose most famous player was an old guy who hadn't played in five years. The season ended with an ugly playoff loss and that was - finally - it for Magic's career. It wasn't as disastrous as Magic's talk show, but it wasn't a whole hell of a lot better.

I saw one game that season, when the Lakers drilled the Timberwolves in Minnesota. But for the most part I've blocked out much of that season, even though it was the final one for my all-time favorite athlete. You'd think I'd remember more about the actual end of his legendary career.

The last few days I've been looking back a bit more at that 1996 season, reading old stories and watching old games. And maybe it's time for me to re-assess that half-season. The season didn't add to Magic's legend, but it didn't necessarily detract from it either. He was no longer one of the top two or three players in the league, but he was still plenty good for a 36-year-old who sat out four-and-a-half seasons. He was older and slower, grouchier and, at times, a bit angrier. He wasn't the Earvin Johnson of old but there was still a touch of magic.

In 1995, the Lakers finally emerged from the mediocrity that afflicted the franchise after Magic's 1991 retirement and went 48-34, before upsetting Seattle in the playoffs and losing to San Antonio in six games. The team had young talent, with Nick Van Exel, Anthony Peeler and Eddie Jones emerging as legitimate players. Cedric Ceballos turned his career around and averaged 21 a game. They had a flopping Vlade at center, Elden Campbell - or, as he was officially named The Enigmatic Elden Campbell - at power forward and decent depth. But they struggled at the start of the 1996 season. They started the year 13-13. They were 24-18 after a victory over the Nets on January 27.

And that's when Magic returned. This classic Gary Smith article tells much of the story of Magic's decision. There was the All-Star game return in 1992, the Dream Team and then an abbreviated comeback in the fall of that year, which basically ended when Magic got cut during a game and the video of him bleeding on the court became yet another iconic image of his career, only this one didn't leave anyone smiling.

But in 1996 he returned, and not just for one game or a few exhibition contests. He returned in the middle of a season to a team that was 24-18.

The first game was at The Forum, the site of so many classic moments, against the Golden State Warriors and rookie Joe Smith. The Lakers won 128-118, a flashback game that looked more like one from 1986 than '96. Magic played 27 minutes and had 19 points, 10 assists and eight boards, a decent night for any player, an extraordinary performance for a guy coming off the 1,800-day disabled list.



At the 1:20 mark of that video comes perhaps Magic's most famous play that season, the fake pass that left Latrell Sprewell bewildered and the crowd delirious.

Reality, for the team, hit a game later, when the Bulls - who came into the game sporting an absurd 40-3 record - rolled to a 99-84 victory in LA. Following the game, Michael Jordan - who was in the middle of a triumphant comeback but would eventually attempt his own ill-advised one - proved something of a prophet when he said he told Magic he had a killer instinct look in his eyes but his teammates didn't.

If there was any question about that, it was proven when Ceballos - apparently forgetting that he was Cedric Ceballos - left the team in March, upset about playing time. He eventually returned but the team was seemingly divided. Later, Van Exel was suspended for bumping a referee. Magic, being the leader he was and wanting to show the younger guys how to properly intimidate the stripes, did the same, albeit a bit softer, a few games later and earned his own suspension. And once the playoffs began, it seemed almost inevitable that the two-time defending champion Rockets, despite not having homecourt, would eliminate the Lakers, which they did in four games.

But there were plenty of highlights, despite the fact I've blocked many of them over the last 15 years. And many of them are online. YouTube user nonplayerzealot is one of the best online historians of all-things Lakers and he has a huge collection of games from that 1996 season.



This game against the Jazz was something of a grudge match, four years in the making. When Magic first returned in 1992, Karl Malone expressed reservations about playing against someone with HIV. Malone took some heat for the comments, though he was only expressing thoughts that were surely shared by many other players at that time. Magic prevailed on this night, though, scoring 21 points to go along with seven rebounds, six assists and one Showtime flashback at the 2:30 mark.

Here against the Bucks, Magic finished with 20 points and eight assists.



The Lakers had some impressive victories in the second-half of the season. They handed Orlando its first home loss of the season, after the Magic had won their first 33 games at home. After Magic joined the team, LA went 29-11, basically a 60-win pace. Magic averaged 14 points and seven assists a game. One of his signature moves during his comeback came in the post, where he often tossed lobs to Jones or Ceballos who cut through the lane while Magic backed the defender down into the paint. He still had the hook, he still possessed the set shot from deep. He still smiled. And, on occasion, he could still lead a break, running it at 36 like he did when he was 26.

Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of Magic's 1996 comeback is that it showed what the Lakers lost when he left the first time. Magic was still great in 1991 and was still good in 1996. How far could he have led the Lakers in 1992 and beyond? His knees had a lot of mileage on them but in 1992 the Lakers had finally signed a decent backup point guard in Sedale Threatt. Magic would have changed his game but remained effective and, likely, dominant for at least a few more seasons. He still would have been the smartest player on the court and few backcourt players would have had a chance against him in the post. Maybe the Bulls don't have their first three-peat if Magic stayed around. But then they probably don't get Shaq or Kobe and who knows where the franchise would be today.

No, there no iconic moments from that comeback season. But there were just enough Magic moments in 1996 to conjure up memories of the '80s and to remind people of what was lost in 1991.

Magic Johnson's final high school game

Earvin Johnson became Magic when he was still in high school, thanks to a sportswriter who gave him the moniker after watching the young star dominate. As the story goes, he couldn't go by Dr. J because that had been taken, as had The Big E. So it was Magic Johnson, double-entendres be damned.

By his senior year at Everett High School in Lansing, Michigan, Magic was a legend. He led his team to the Class A state championship game against Birmingham Brother Rice.

The footage lives.



Everett won 62-56 in overtime. Two years later, Magic led Michigan State to the NCAA title, and a year after that he won Finals MVP as the Lakers won the NBA title. Three titles at three different levels in four years.

The title game footage is incredible to watch, even if it does look like it took place in 1957 instead of '77. Magic's game was ahead of the times but his hairstyle was with the times. He sported an Afro, which was long gone by the time he scored 42 points in Game 6 of the 1980 Finals.

A couple of things:
* Several times Magic drains a little turnaround jumper on the baseline. I watched hundreds of his games in the 1980s and have watched a hundred more on YouTube. Rarely did he use this turnaround jumper in the NBA. Where'd it go? It was, in fact, an Elvin Hayes-like turnaround jumper, but seems to have disappeared as his game progressed in so many other areas.

* Check out the pass at the 54-second mark. A classic Magic look, the type you'd see to Rambis or AC Green in the ensuing years. Unlike AC Green, though, his high school teammate made the layup.

* Magic did most of his damage in the post. He possessed a sort-of-unsightly jumper, a shot that he didn't really perfect until the middle to late 1980s. Even then, it was more set shot than jump shot.

* The analyst offers nothing. I'm not sure who it is, probably a former Michigan legend who only broadcast games every March and ran a used car dealership the other 11 months of the year. "Boy it looked awful easy," chuckle, chuckle. "That's Earvin Magic Johnson," chuckle. "I think he's got his rhythm, Mike." "That wasn't a bad shot, Mike. Wasn't a bad shot at all," chuckle.

* At the 2:40 mark, another great Magic pass. At times he simply overpowers the opponent, looking something like the mustached 14-year-old who dominates 8th-grade basketball games thanks to size alone, but the skills that made him a pro legend and not just a schoolboy one are also on display.

* This game has an insane ending. Everett leads by 2 in the closing seconds. Rice brings the ball up and the guard launches from just inside the halfcourt line at the buzzer...and banks it in! You can see Magic preparing to celebrate even as the ball falls through the net. It's like the shot Butler had that would have defeated Duke in the NCAA Finals last year, or the shot that Fritz Skinner used to beat Worthington Community College on a cold night in 1994 (still very bitter about that one, since he shot it right in front of me). Fans actually come onto the court. But it only tied it. If there had been a 3-point line, obviously Rice would have won. Then again, if there had been a 3-point line Jerry West's famous shot against the Knicks would have won the game and the Lakers wouldn't have lost in OT. Rice also falls, despite the miracle.

* Magic takes over in overtime. A perfect bounce pass for a layup. Then, at the 3:55 mark, a behind-the-back dribble leads to an open-court reverse layup. Even today, more than 30 years later, it's not the type of move you see many 6-9 point guards make. Actually, there still hasn't ever been another 6-9 point guard.

* According to the person who posted the video on YouTube - a person who should be put up for sainthood - Magic scored 34 points, though you wouldn't know that from the stumbling post-game interview.

In the interview Magic sounds like a kid, which he was. His interviewing skills improved over the years, as did his jumper. But the passing and intangibles that made him one of the greatest winners in basketball history? Those skills were already fully formed.

Well, maybe Jon Koncak was worth more than Michael Jordan

I've read about 100 pages of a new book I got for Christmas, When the Game was Ours, by Larry Bird and Magic Johnson, though sportswriter Jackie MacMullan handled the actual writing of the book. I read several chapters today while avoiding my dad's taunting phone calls during the Lakers debacle against Cleveland.

Remarkably, the book's managed to reveal new details about the players, details I didn't even know, though I thought I'd read pretty much every story and anecdote about each Hall of Famer. My favorite quote so far comes from Bird. Apparently, Bird's Indiana State teammates and Magic's Michigan State teammates expressed some jealousy about the attention each player received while in college, even though each player was nearly single-handedly responsible for turning the programs into national powers. When asked about the jealousy of his teammates, Bird said, "Somebody asked me once how I felt about all that. I told them, 'Hell, I'm jealous of them too. I'm jealous because I never got to play with a Larry Bird."

It's an amazingly arrogant quote, something that would be the subject of a special 2-hour episode of Outside the Lines on ESPN if Kobe Bryant said something similar about his teammates today. And it's also a perfect quote, the type of reply only one of the 10 best players in NBA history could get away with.

Later, in his early years with the Lakers, some of Magic's teammates also became jealous of the attention heaped on the young star. Much of it stemmed from the 25-year, $25 million contract he signed early in his career, a pact that was remarkable not for the money, but for the length. Although at the time, the money too - a million a year - was also fairly staggering.

Today of course someone making a million dollars a year in the NBA is probably a guy who plays about 5 minutes a game and is kept on the roster simply because he's a good chemistry guy and practices hard.

Who makes the most money in today's NBA? Kobe? Duncan? Shaq? LeBron? No, no, no, and no.

Tracy McGrady. $23,329,561.

This is the last year of his deal, meaning McGrady's days of seeing that type of money will be long gone when he signs his next deal in the Summer of LeBron.

It's obviously preposterous that McGrady is the highest-paid player in the league, but then again, Jermaine O'Neal is the third-highest paid player, so it's not the only deal that doesn't make much sense. But then, it's always been like that in the NBA.

Browsing through Basketball Reference is an eye-opening experience when searching out salary history.

Take the 1988 Chicago Bulls. The Bulls finished 50-32 that season as Michael Jordan averaged 35 points and five assists a game. That year he solidified his spot as a basketball legend, and a sporting icon off the court. Those results were good enough to land him the second-highest-paid contract on the team, as he made $845,000. The highest-paid Bull? Artis Gilmore, whose professional career had peaked a decade earlier in the ABA. Big Artis pulled in $863,00 that season.

Sticking with the late 1980s, the 1987 Lakers were one of the best teams in NBA history, winning 67 regular season games and the title thanks to a devastating fastbreak and Magic's first MVP season. Magic won the MVP, Kareem was still effective, and another Hall of Famer, James Worthy, averaged 19 points per game. So, of course, the highest-paid player was Michael Cooper. Granted, Coop was the Defensive Player of the Year. And he was a vital role player. But he should not have been pulling in $3,565,500 when Magic took in $2,500,000. I'm sure no one was jealous of Magic's contract that season.

Sometimes bad contracts literally destroy franchises, which is basically what happened with Seattle in the 1990s. The Sonics took the legendary Bulls team to six games in the NBA Finals in 1996. In several of those games, Shawn Kemp was the best player on the floor, despite the fact Jordan, Gary Payton and Scottie Pippen were sharing it with him. Seattle appeared set to contend for the next decade.

Then they signed a 7-foot stiff disguised as a center, who went by the name of Jim McIlvaine. Looking for a center in the Jon Koncak/Uwe Blab/Bill Wennington/Will Perdue/Joe Klein mold - tall, personable, pale-skinned, and bad at basketball - the Sonics inked McIlvaine to a seven-year deal worth $33.6 million. The previous season, Big Mac averaged 2.3 points and yanked down 2.9 boards per game. The move infuriated many of the Sonics, most notably Kemp. The star forward did make more than McIlvaine that year - $3.3 million compared to $3 million for McIlvaine - but he'd also been asking for an increase, which the organization refused to give him. At the end of the year Seattle dealt Kemp to Cleveland, assuring his career would become most notable for his epic weight gain and the number of children he sired. Seattle, meanwhile, faded from power. McIlvaine? Oh, McIlvaine was fine, finishing his career in 2001 with the Nets, a season that saw him make $5.4 million. That year he averaged 1.6 more points per game than I did for the Nets, appearing in 18 games.

Speaking of Jon Koncak, long before McIlvaine gave below-average centers a bad name with his outrageous contract, Koncak signed a famous six-year deal worth $13 million with the Atlanta Hawks. At the time, it meant Koncak made more money than Jordan, Bird and Magic, the only time his name was ever mentioned with those three. Koncak averaged 4.5 points per game in his career. The 1992 Hawks were a fascinating team. Not on the court, where they finished 38-44, but off it. Dominique Wilkins rightfully made the most money on the team, pulling in $3.1 million. Koncak was next with two million. Third? Blair Rasmussen, with $1.5 million. Blair Rasmussen, the seventh-leading scorer on the team, a guy who scored 9 points a game.

But then again, Blair was white. And seven-feet tall. In the NBA, those two qualifications often seem to be more important than a decent jump shot or rebounding skills.

So maybe McGrady's 2010 contract isn't so outrageous. We should just be thankful Joel Przybilla isn't the highest-paid player in the league.

Magic Johnson's last good game

The YES Network - the station for all Yankees-related propaganda ("George Steinbrenner's passion for winning inspired respect from all") - just replayed Jim Abbott's no-hitter from September 4, 1993 as part of their Yankees Classics series.

Occasionally the network has a rather broad definition of what makes a classic. Is a game really a classic because Melky Cabrera robbed a homer from Manny Ramirez? YES says yes, those immune to the allure of pinstripes say no.

Abbott's certainly qualifies and is one of several no-hitters and perfect games the network trots out every few weeks, from David Wells's mastery of the Twins in 1998, to David Cone's perfect effort a year later.

It got me thinking about how cool it would be to attend a game like Abbott's. You go to the park expecting a typical 5-3 affair. Three hours later you've just witnessed baseball history. And as I thought about it, I realized that the professional games I've attended have really been lacking in drama, excitement and history, no matter the sport. Even if I use YES's definition of the word, I'd probably be unable to find any that were classic.

Not that I've seen hundreds of games. We'd go to a couple of Twins games every year, a handful of Timberwolves losses and I've seen two or three Vikings games. In elementary school our group traveled to the Metrodome and saw Kirby Puckett win the game with a home run in the bottom of the ninth. But that was a regular season game, not Game 6 of the 1991 World Series.

Since moving to New York I've gone to two Knicks games, five games at Yankee Stadium - all wins by the Yankees, none classics - and a couple of Mets games. They were all rather mundane, although attending a game last year two weeks before the Stadium closed was a memorable experience. But that had everything to do with the atmosphere, and little to do with the play.

With so few candidates to choose from, it seems the best professional game I've attended came in 1996, when I saw the Timberwolves host the Lakers late in the regular season. Basketball Reference tells me the game was actually on April 10, 1996. The final score: Lakers 111, Timberwolves 90. Nothing memorable about that result. But what stands out is that Magic Johnson was playing for the Lakers. It was two months into his comeback, and just a few weeks before his final retirement.

Magic only scored six points, to go along with 10 rebounds and 11 assists. I looked up those numbers, but several of the assists remain etched in my mind, ready to be conjured up on a moment's notice. Many of the 11 assists were classic Magic, from the no-look alley-oops out of the post to the one-handed bounce passes that traveled 30 feet and hit their target in stride. It could have been any Magic game between 1980 and 1991. Those games I watched on TV. I'd only seen him play live once before - in 1984 the Lakers played an exhibition game in Minneapolis as Minnesota attempted to land an NBA franchise. Instead, the Timberwolves arrived in 1989.

The significance of the game rose in stature because of what came next. Two games later, Magic temporarily lost his mind - the same thing happened two years later when he said yes to the idea of hosting a talk show - and bumped a referee, earning a suspension. He returned, but Houston eliminated the Lakers in four games in the first round of the playoffs. Magic, who by then was no longer rounding into shape but was simply getting round, finally looked like a guy who hadn't played in five years. That game in Minneapolis, the game I got to see, was the final time a guy from Michigan named Earvin played like Magic Johnson. While it might not have been a classic, it remains a vivid memory. And maybe that's even better.

A surprising birthday

Magic Johnson turned 50 on Friday. It's a surprising number, considering people started writing his obituary on November 7, 1991. That was the day Magic announced his retirement, with the oddly phrased line, "Because of the HIV virus that I have attained, I will have to retire from the Lakers."

Magic Johnson's the only athlete I ever idolized, starting from the time I was five years old. My first memory of watching him is of an old news clip that showed him rehabbing from a knee injury he suffered during the 1980-81 season, his second in the NBA. For the next 10 years, I watched every Lakers game that was on CBS, TBS, TNT, and NBC. I'd plead with my parents to let me stay up for the late West Coast games, blackmail them if needed.

I put up Magic Johnson posters. I read every word in Sports Illustrated, bought countless Basketball Digests, Inside Sports, Sport Magazines, Basketball Registers, and NBA Guides. I patterned my own game after him, as much as a small white kid could pattern his game after him (I threw some no-look passes).

I heard about Magic's retirement from my sister, who called me after school and asked if I'd heard about Magic. Um, no. "He's retiring because he has AIDS."

I figured she was joking, but it turned out she was right, at least about the first part, if technically wrong about the second. I watched the press conference and learned he had HIV, not AIDS, a point that meant nothing at the time but obviously meant everything in retrospect. Magic missed the first few games of that season with what the team kept calling a flu-like illness. In reality, they knew the diagnosis but were taking time to confirm it.

And that was the end of Showtime. The Lakers wandered aimlessly through the next few seasons, led by a thirtysomething James Worthy who had the knees of a fiftysomething, the virginal A.C. Green, and the immortal Sedale Threatt, whose greatest claim to fame was that the Bulls got rid of him because his partying was thought to be a bad influence on the young stars of that budding dynasty.

Dynasties always end in basketball. But the superstars who lead them aren't supposed to die as well. And many people figured Magic didn't have much time. When I cried throughout the night he announced his retirement, I'm sure part of it was for an immature reason: the Lakers were no longer going to win titles. But mostly I cried because I figured Magic would be dead within a year or two, five at the most. I didn't know much about HIV and AIDS, but I knew you died if you had either diagnosis.

Now, eighteen years later, Magic is still here, celebrating another birthday. He remains omnipresent, for better or worse. Usually worse. From his foray as a color commentator with NBC in the 1992 Finals, to his short, failed stretch as a Lakers coach in 1994, to his autobiography where he bragged about so many sexual conquests I was convinced Jenna Jameson ghost-wrote it, to his comeback and pushing of a ref in 1996, to his late-night talk show that was so bad it made Chevy Chase look like a combination of Carson and Letterman, to his current stint as a studio analyst for ABC, Magic is everywhere. And he's often ridiculed for his efforts, from media critics and even some out-there Laker fans, who are convinced he's jealous of Kobe Bryant and analyze every statement for signs that he's not worshipful enough of Bryant.

To me none of that matters. I don't care how many ludicrous projects he undertakes or how many times he makes inane points while awkwardly bantering with Stuart Scott and Jon Barry. He could sign up for a reality show with Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt and it still wouldn't bother me.

None of it matters. What matters is that he's still here. Still on TV. Still involved as an owner with the Lakers. Still a businessman.

Still alive. And on November 7, 1991, I didn't think there was anyway possible Magic Johnson would ever make it to 50.

Here's some of my favorite Sports Illustrated stories on Magic over the years.

With the Big Fella out, Magic was the Man
Magic faces the music
The Last Dance?
Unforgettable
True Lies (the classic Gary Smith story on Magic's 1996 comeback, his second comeback if you're keeping score, after one in 1992).

And some classic Magic highlights, from his playing days, not his talk show.




Magic's hook shot against the Celtics in Game 4 of the 1987 Finals was undoubtedly his greatest shot. But this one is my second-favorite, even though it came in a meaningless regular season game against lowly Washington. This is why I always begged my parents to let me stay up late for West Coast games.