A Clipper Fan Learns It’s Not Easy Being Easy

Let us really stretch our imaginations today and pretend that you are a loyal fan of those wacky, wacky L.A. Clippers.

As you probably know, the Clippers are coming to the Inglewood Forum tonight for another evening of alleged professional basketball.

Their opponents: The lovely and talented Lakers, the best team money can buy.

Just last Friday, the Lakers went to the Clip joint to play. They beat the Clippers at the Sports Arena by, oh, about a million points.

The Lakers are a very good team. The Clippers are not a very good team.

Think of them as Win Angeles and Loss Angeles.

But today we are making believe that you are a true-blue L.A. Clipper fan.

Maybe you are from San Diego and were forced to choose between coming to L.A. or sitting in an empty gym.

Maybe you had to think about that before deciding.

Anyway, let us say that you intend to go to the Forum tonight to pull for those lovable lugs from across town.

For tickets, the Lakers are asking $19.50, $14.50, $11.50, $9.50 and $7, not counting the seats at courtside, which only entertainers and people with oil wells can afford.

If the Clippers really are your team . . . if you really want to represent them at the game, do not pay those ticket prices.

Haggle.

Bring them down.

Offer 16 bucks for the most expensive seat. Say you will not pay a penny more.

Then hang around and wait to see if anyone else offers more. If someone does, elbow him aside and offer just as much.

Never mind if the security people have to be called in. Stand your ground. Make your point. Even if you do not get into the game until late in the first quarter.

Remember, parsimony is the best policy. A Clipper and his money are not soon parted. You, too, can try to Clip somebody.

So, come on! Get in the team spirit! I’m a Clipper, he’s a Clipper, wouldn’t you like to be a Clipper, too?

Let’s relive some of those great moments in L.A. Clipper history:

--The Clippers flee San Diego.

--The league sues the Clippers for $25 million for fleeing without a license.

--The Clippers sue the league for $100 million, which is their way of saying, “Oh, yeah?”

--The Clippers trade a whole bunch of players, including Terry Cummings, to the Milwaukee Bucks for a whole bunch of players, including Marques Johnson.

--The Clippers sue to get the Bucks back, or some bucks back, because Johnson had spent some time in a drug rehab center and the Bucks supposedly knew about it without tattling.

--Johnson takes the Clippers to arbitration because they decided to defer a bunch of his money. The Clippers say Johnson agreed to that. Johnson says no such thing.

--The Clippers sign Michael Cage. A team in Italy sues them because, it says, it has already signed Michael Cage.

--The Clippers need a coach. Don Chaney wants to be that coach. They offer him $80,000 for one year. In the NBA, the custodians get better deals than that. Weeks go by without a coach. Chaney finally works them up to 95 grand.

--The Clippers need a center. They draft Benoit Benjamin. Weeks go by. Training camp is a week and a half old before they sign him.

--The Clippers need Norm Nixon. Nixon wants more money. He wants less money deferred and more dollar bills in his hand, where he can see them. Weeks go by. The season begins without him.

--The Clippers dare Nixon to get a better offer. Seattle gives him one: $2.7 million over five years. Not to mention a $500,000 loan. Now, the Clippers have to match it. A couple of weeks earlier, they could have signed him for much less.

--The Clippers’ leading scorer, Derek Smith, gets seriously hurt. He is a guard, same as Nixon. The Clippers say, ‘Boy, do we need Norman now.’

--The Clippers say OK, gosh darn it, they will have to pay up. But not before a few details are straightened out. The NBA straightens out a few details. Seattle gets permission to sweeten the pot.

--Nixon remains in basketball limbo.

--The Clippers (cough) “go up against” the Lakers.

Somewhere in this mess, there is a basketball team. There are Nixon and Benjamin, who have to get in shape after starting late. There are Nixon and Johnson and the coach, who have to swallow their resentment. There is Smith, who has to heal up.

There are Cedric Maxwell, Jamaal Wilkes and Junior Bridgeman, who have to try to remember what it was like to play for winning teams.

If you are loyal to the Clippers, you had better not call them a screwed-up team.

They could sue you for definition of character.